Quantum Zoo

by D.J. Gelner (Author/Editor), J.M. Ney-Grimm (Author/Editor), A.C. Smyth

From a ghost park to a time-travel penitentiary of murderers to a menagerie of Egyptian deities, Quantum Zoo presents 12 compelling stories involving 12 very different living exhibitions. Including a wonderfully atmospheric tale by Hugo- and Nebula-nominated Bridget McKenna.

The Stories

"A King in Exile" – Lady Penelope Smythe-Everton, a nineteenth century British aristocrat with a penchant for adventures to exotic locales, leads an unconventional life. When she brings home a very curious egg from one such excursion, the unconventional becomes ... unique.

"Echoes of Earth" – Tentacle-laden aliens abduct family man Bill when he steps out for an evening jog. He awakens powerless, not in the pulp-classic alien embrace, but displayed in an interstellar zoo, tormented by all the different species that pass through.

"Bestiarum" – Humanity's last survivors hurtle toward a barely-habitable planet light years away in a failing lifeboat, stressed from generations of wear-and-tear. When Zookeeper Thimet meets a group of schoolchildren in the ship's Bestiarum, one little girl's curiosity gets the better of her. What dangerous secret has Thimet been hiding for decades...?

"Ignoble Deeds" – Lila embarks on a disquieting errand to give her dying and troubled mother peace of mind. It takes every bit of craftiness and deceit she can muster to get inside the new tourist attraction that's set up shop in an old, abandoned zoo. You won't believe what happens once she does...

"At Home in the Stars" – When two manicure-loving, jacuzzi-seeking, pink cadillac-admiring friends tangle with the alien masters of the galaxy, who wins? The ladies? The aliens? Or good ol' human nature?

"The Most Dangerous Lies" – A new zoo puts some of history's most evil monsters on display for the public to see in the flesh, but is their newest addition – Jack the Ripper – too dangerous to be left to his own devices?

"Playing Man" – Corporate executive Jordem Lun revisits Earth during his annual vacation. Maintained as a vast safari preserve, the old home planet displays gorgeous scenery and breathtaking wildlife, but something mysterious acts in its shadows.

"You'll Be So Happy, My Dear" – An inexperienced spacefarer seeks local help when her starship malfunctions near a backwater planet. The most prominent ad on the internet directs her to just the right repair shop. Or does it?

"Skipdrive" – Alien leviathans, discovered floating in space beyond the orbit of Neptune, provoke a “space race” between the competing nations of Earth. Maintenance Chief Eliza, half-cyborg and immune to the strange side effects of the skipdrive, suspects that the first ship on the scene – hers – just made a very big mistake.

"Demon Rising" – A monster lives under little Katherine’s bed. She knows he means her no harm, but would anyone else agree?

"Your Day at the Zoo" – What if you inhabited the consciousness of a great cat or a lazily coiled serpent or a great ape for just one day? What would it be like?

"Serpent's Foe" – Bastet, divine protectress of the gods themselves, lies defeated in a cage. Trapped in beast form, imprisoned behind bars, and confused by nightmares, she longs for freedom.

Genres: Short Stories, Science Fiction, Anthologies, Fantasy, Ebooks

252 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 15, 2014

About the author

Where do I start? Born and raised in St. Louis, graduated from Dartmouth in 2005 and the University of Virginia School of Law in 2008. Practiced law until 2011, when I quit to pursue my dream of writing.

I caught on as the St. Louis Rams Reporter for insideSTL.com and did some radio work for 590 AM the Fan KFNS and 1380 AM the Fan 2. As soon as the (very trying for anyone following the Rams) 2011 NFL season ended, I started working on my novels. The insideSTL gig ended in June, and I focused all of my attention on starting up a small publisher (Orion's Comet).

Other interesting stuff about me: I've forgotten how to ride a bike. I once swam so much over the course of a summer that my hair became green. I'm always fighting a three-pronged war between a paleo lifestyle and my love of wine and ice cream. And my dog, Sully, looks like a big shih tzu--he's 33 pounds.

Feel free to contact me via e-mail (djgelbooks@gmail.com) or follow me on twitter (@djgelner). I look forward to discussing many fine books with you!

Reviews

[Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received a copy of this book for purposes of review via one of the authors, A.C. Smyth.

I've been reading and reviewing a lot of anthologies lately, mostly Best Of collections of classic or recent SFF, so I was pleased to find that these stories mostly stood up pretty well in comparison. As in any anthology, some worked better than others, and some had more editing issues than others (note: I received a pre-publication ARC, so some edits were done between the time I read it and the time of publication), but overall it was a good collection. All of the stories had narrative arcs and endings, which is not inevitable these days, but which I personally prefer.

The theme is simply "zoo". Given such a broad theme, the contributors have come up with remarkably varied stories, mostly science fiction but a couple of fantasies. There are some very general commonalities; the contributors seem united in their view that being in a zoo is not a good thing, and nobody really emphasised the conservation aspect of zoos, which surprised me slightly.

The opening story, "A King in Exile" by Bridget McKenna, was a good choice for the opening. A Victorian tale of the last T-Rex intertwined with the frustrated love of a couple kept separated by social convention, it was moving and well-told, with no glitches to take me out of the period or the plot.

"Echoes of Earth" by D.J. Gelner (one of the two editors) was less successful for me. It contained the old trope, old even when Isaac Asimov parodied it in "Playboy and the Slime God" in 1961, of the earthman kidnapped by aliens who is joined by a beautiful woman; he immediately forgets about his wife and family, she is immediately attracted to him, and they pair up without, apparently, any thought about children born in captivity. Also, the first-person narrator refers to "this journal" without any indication of how he has a journal to write in or something to write with (he's keeping track of days by scratching marks on the wall with his fingernails), and the ending is such that the journal idea is inexplicable. It's been a very long time since first-person narration needed such framing devices. These days it's enough to just narrate in first person without implying an audience or a transmission medium.

I enjoyed "Bestiarium" by Sarah Stegall. Its theme of the transmission of tradition from one generation to another and the importance of a connection to nature - not just for reasons of humanity, but as a necessity for survival in the future - worked well, and the generation-ship setting was sketched competently.

"Ignoble Deeds" by A.C. Smyth is the first story in the collection that isn't straight science fiction in its premise, though the fascinating idea of a "ghost zoo" is treated science-fictionally. I was completely blindsided by the twist, and thought it might have been over-enthusiastically hidden by the author, but looking at the opening quotation again reminds me that it was, in fact, signalled in advance.

"At Home in the Stars" by S.E. Batt sets out to be humour in the vein of Fredric Brown, but for me fell a little short, in part because I was distracted by several typos, and by odd phrasings that made me wonder if English is a second language for the author. The joke itself is a mild and predictable one, but it was somewhat entertaining.

"The Most Dangerous Lies" by Ken Furie has the "zoo" inhabited by great tyrants and serial killers from the past, abducted through a handwaved technology. The premise is an interesting one, marred for me by the fact that the central character is Jack the Ripper, and the author doesn't seem to have spent much time familiarising himself with the actual Jack the Ripper case, or with other historical points. For example, a woman wouldn't be addressed as "Gov'ness" in the same way a man was called "Gov'nor". At one point, Jack "knew that adrenaline coursed through her body," which seems slightly unlikely given that the earliest usage of the word "adrenaline" occurs several years after the Ripper murders ceased, and Jack is depicted as uneducated. Possible, I suppose, but not likely. If one ignores these research issues, though, the story itself is a good one.

"Playing Man" by Scott Dyson is set on a voluntarily depopulated Earth, with most of the human race living off-planet, and is the classic story of the clash of large corporate interests with ecological concerns. I enjoyed it, and liked the protagonist.

"You'll Be So Happy, My Dear" by John Hindmarsh is science-fictional horror, not my favourite thing. It's in second person, which can be a gimmick, but here is justified. The link to the theme of "zoo" is tenuous.

"Skipdrive" by Morgan Johnson manages to invoke the Cthulhu Mythos without once mentioning it or using any of its key terms, for which alone it deserves applause. I found some of the incidental ideas implausible: that someone could be so badly injured that half their brain needed replacing with computer circuitry and still survive; that this could be done with no change to personality or loss of memory or need for long-term rehab; and that the victim (who had also lost an arm and a leg) would be, not just allowed, but more or less forced back into the military afterwards. However, setting those issues aside, I found the arc of the story held my attention well, and I enjoyed the way in which it was told.

"Demon Rising" by R.S. McCoy is a strange little story, in mostly a good way. The themes of loss of innocence and shapist prejudice are well handled, and the connection to the theme is clear. I liked the protagonist, too.

"Your Day at the Zoo" by Frances Stewart was doing something that I never quite figured out. Something to do with the continuity between humans and the rest of the animal kingdom, I think. It was beautifully described, though, and enjoyable.

"Serpent's Foe" by J.M. Ney-Grimm (the second of the two editors) was unfortunately afflicted with multiple typos and some needless pseudo-archaisms. I didn't feel that the viewpoint character had much protagonism; she suffered through a number of events and learned a lesson, but made few meaningful choices other than to accept the lesson. It could also have been trimmed slightly. This is the risk when a contributor is also an editor, and this is why professional anthologies usually keep the two roles separate: we are never as hard on our own work.

Overall, though, Quantum Zoo is a collection of good writing from authors you've probably never heard of. In a number of cases, it's well worth your while to hear of them so you can track down some of their other work (which the editors make easy by providing links after each story, as well as collecting them all at the back). While I had some quibbles with several of the stories, there weren't any that I outright disliked - not the case with several of the pro anthologies I've read recently - and some of them were very good indeed.

On my 10-point scale within the four-star range, where 0 is "just above mediocre" and 9 is "just below amazing", I place Quantum Zoo around the middle at a four or a five.

[Joanne Hall · Rating 4 out of 5]

Disclaimer - I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Quantum Zoo is a collection of fantasy and SF short stories themed around the concept of “zoos”. And while at first that might seem like rather a narrow concept, the authors here have taken the theme and run with it from 19th Century London to the depths of outer space.

The collection starts of very strongly with Bridget McKenna’s “A King In Exile”, a rather sweet Victoriana-meets-Jurrassic-Park story about an explorer’s daughter gifted with a rather special egg. Other highlights in a very strong collection include “Ignoble Deeds” by A C Smyth, set in a zoo for ghosts, which has a killer twist which makes perfect sense in context, and the space opera “Skipdrive” by Morgan Johnson, which draws on Lovecraftian mythos and the creatures that lurk in the dark between the stars. It features a truly unforgettable heroine, and is by turns both humourous and chilling.

If I had to pick a favourite I’d be hard-pressed to choose between R S McCoy’s “Demon Rising” (Katherine takes the monster under her bed on a night-time visit to the zoo, with far-reaching consequences) and “Bestiarum” by Sarah Stegall. This is another space opera, this time set on a generation starship where Thimet, the keeper responsible for keeping the flame of knowledge alive, must find a successor and protect a very special secret. I think “Bestiarum” edges it. by a twitching nose and a trembling whisker.

This is a great collection, and I hadn’t previously read any of the writers featured in it, so I will be looking out for them in future!

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Most of the short stories were really good and the rest were ok. I'm not telling which is which because you need to make that distinction yourself.

[Shanelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was torn between abandoning the book and finishing the rest of the stories. Some of them were weird, a few I really enjoyed. I'll just say if you like weird stories, this is the book for you.

[Joni Graves · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you like short stories then this is the one for you. The stories are kind of creepy and funny on some. It is a really good read. I finished it quick and had a lot of fun reading it.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Short stories are coming back into fashion now, as are anthologies, which can only be applauded. However, reviewing such anthologies becomes a problem as by their very nature short stories grab you or they don't. This is difficult when the anthology is the work of one author, it is even more so when the stories are from twelve different authors, as it is here.

Different authors mean different writing styles and when they are read in relatively quick proximity some of those styles can see clunky – although if it had been allowed to develop over the length of a novel this might not necessarily have been the case. But perhaps here it is my own preferences that are coming to the fore and not the fault of the authors.

The title gives an idea that perhaps what's inside the cover is unlikely to be about the 'normal' zoos (disappearing as they are worldwide) that people are used to visiting. Most of the zoos here are other worldly, off world, and even the one that approximates to what is recognised as a zoo on Earth, with cages and enclosures, has a supernatural aspect which provides an unexpected twist.

In a sense some of these stories have been prompted by Kurt Vonnegut's 'Slaughterhouse 5', where an earthling has been kidnapped by aliens and put on exhibition. Whilst saying that those that take the idea as a starting point veer off to a completely different ending – often not a very pleasant one at that.

Here we have a dinosaur out of its own time; an exhibit that thinks things are getting better, only to learn their ultimate fate is different from their perceptions; the question if we will forget what used to exist out of ignorance and carelessness; a ghost being punished for his deeds during life; how the human race, even when given a lot, spoils it all by wanting more; Jack the Ripper getting his comeuppance; how primates fill the gap; a 'spider' trapping his victims to perpetuate his race and also to get a means of escape; human arrogance that could lead to the destruction of the human race only being averted at the last minute; the dangers of putting too much trust in a child (and God); and the last two stories which left me cold.

In general this was an interesting collection of stories which, through the weird and the wonderful, attempted to make a comment on how we live now and how we might mess things up in the future.

[Samantha Strong · Rating 5 out of 5]

My Rating: 4.5 of 5 stars

Note: I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Even though I've reviewed several short story collections, I'm usually on the fence about reading them. I prefer novels because I like to get invested in the characters and story. Especially when it comes to multiple authors, you never know what you're going to get from one page to the next.

However, I'm happy to report that Quantum Zoo is awesome. If you asked me to pick a favorite story, I wouldn't be able to, and I might not even be able to rank my top 5. I was only disinterested in one story, the final one, and that was because I couldn't figure out what was going on. Maybe I missed something; maybe the story was too esoteric for my taste.

The stories themselves are varied, from humans in an alien zoo to a pet tyrannosaurus to an arrogant, long-forgotten goddess who embodies different animals and people throughout time. I was impressed with the unique takes on the zoo theme. In one story, mammoth and sinister beasts were found floating at the outer edges of the solar system and, like Lovecraft's Old Ones, had sinister plans for the human race. (I lied; I would pick that one as my favorite. I love Lovecraft.)

Impeccably edited and with a great variety of stories, Quantum Zoo is a collection that I would recommend to lovers of speculative fiction. You just might find a new author--or twelve--that you'll just have to read more of.

Also posted on my blog, Magic & Mayhem Book Reviews.

[Connie Cockrell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Please note that I received a free ARC copy of this book for review.
Quantum Zoo is a collection of short stories by different authors in different genres, all writing to the same theme, Zoo. Many of the stories were melancholy or even scary. One, by S.E. Batt, was humorous. All of them were excellent.
Each story dealt with the concept of zoo in different ways. They were thought provoking and unique and covered the spectrum from horror to SciFi.
I love that the format of short stories allows the reader to read one at a time and let the story soak in before taking on the next one. It's been a long time since mainstream publishing has put out good short story collections. The last story, by J.M. Ney-Grimm took the concept of a zoo and really turned it on its head. But don't read this one first.
Savor each story in its turn. After reading the entire anthology I felt that the overall feel of the anthology is sad but the individual stories more than make up for that short-coming. While this would be a great read anytime, I'd certainly take this book on vacation with me or buy it for a gift. Best of all, if the reader really enjoys any of the stories, there are links at the end of each story and the end of the book that allows the reader to find more of that author's work. Well done to each author and to the editors, D.J. Gelner and J.M. Ney-Grimm. This is a lovely piece of work.

[J. · Rating 3 out of 5]

If the stories in this spec fic anthology had been reversed, I might not have read them all. As things stand, the first ones are the best. "A King in Exile," "At Home in the Stars," and "The Most Dangerous Lies" are five-star stories; "Echoes of Earth" and "Ignoble Deeds" would earn four stars if reviewed individually.

But the later stories, for various reasons, didn't work for me. "Playing Man" felt cliched with a greedy corporation, yadda times three. "Skipdrive" didn't have a solid ending, "Your Day at the Zoo" is second person PoV and kinda runs off the rails, and "Serpent's Foe" never quite came together.

Funny, how the dividing line between the stories I liked and those I didn't is so sharp. We'll call this one three stars.

[Cynthia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent and diverse stories

Prior to reading this book; a collection of short stories, I believed I wouldn't enjoy reading a book of this sort. Somehow I had it in my head that short stories couldn't engage me as do longer books. I am so pleased to learn I was mistaken! Short stories CAN engage and entertain, and leave you with the sense of satisfaction derived from closure.

The stories within Quantum Zoo are at once diverse yet of related genres. The writing is stellar, as is the editing. A truly enjoyable compilation leading me to the discovery of exceptionally talented indie authors of whose work I may not have otherwise read. Highly recommended!

[Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm biased, because I have a story in here (under the name "Scott Dyson") but there were eleven other stories that I loved. Some more than others, naturally. "Echoes of Earth" stood out, as did the somewhat humorous "At Home In The Stars" and "Bestiarum" and "Serpent's Foe." But they were all good.

I'm a reader of SF and Fantasy (more SF than fantasy, I suppose) and found this collection (not including my own story, which I'm not qualified to comment on) to be a very satisfying read.

[Robert · Rating 3 out of 5]

A collection of short stories that I flew through.

Most are themes that you have read before in science fiction but they are still enjoyable and well written.

[Greg · Rating 3 out of 5]

A unique sci-fi collection of stories of zoos, some quite hilarious.

[LeeAnn · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars. Amazing the variety of stories that can arise from a one word prompt: zoo. I found at least two-thirds of these stories great reading. The others weren't bad stories, just not to my tastes. Recommended.

[MB (What she read)]

I read the first 5 chapters, then ran out of steam.