Sooner or Later Everything Falls Into the Sea

by Sarah Pinsker

The baker's dozen stories gathered here (including a new, previously unpublished story) turn readers into travelers to the past, the future, and explorers of the weirder points of the present. The journey is the thing as Pinsker weaves music, memory, technology, history, mystery, love, loss, and even multiple selves on generation ships and cruise ships, on highways and high seas, in murder houses and treehouses. They feature runaways, fiddle-playing astronauts, and retired time travelers; they are weird, wired, hopeful, haunting, and deeply human. They are often described as beautiful but Pinsker also knows that the heart wants what the heart wants and that is not always right, or easy.

Genres: Short Stories, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Fiction, LGBT, Speculative Fiction, Queer

288 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 19, 2019

Reviews

[Nataliya · Rating 4 out of 5]

By the end of this story collection I realized that Sarah Pinsker’s writing has grown on me. I’ll be honest - it took me a little while. Her writing is really good, but something about the way she tells her stories — almost vignette-like at times, often leaving you hanging just at that moment when you want and need more — was initially holding me back from loving it. But then a few stories in, when I got into Pinsker’s writing rhythm and the peculiarities of her storytelling I realized how much I was enjoying this book.

Pinsker’s stories, at least the ones in this collection (a smallish sample of her generous short stories output, apparently), for all their variety seem to center a lot on music (apparently besides being a writer, she is also a musician) and memory, the two motifs most prominent in most of them, told through the filter of melancholy and contemplation. And it all somehow works, making the collection seem quite cohesive and a real whole built out of stories as building blocks.

Pinsker’s narrative voice is quiet and enchanting, with laid-back writing offsetting strange flights of fancy - there’s a prosthetic arm that thinks itself a stretch of a Colorado highway (“A Stretch of Highway Two Lanes Wide”), and dream children coming out of the ocean ( “And We Were Left Darkling”).

“Being a road wasn’t so bad, once he got used to it.”

“Somewhere, in some medical waste bin back in Saskatoon, there was a computer chip that knew it was a road. A chip that was an arm that was Andy who was a stretch of asphalt two lanes wide, ninety-seven kilometers long, in eastern Colorado. A stretch that could see all the way to the mountains, but was content not to reach them. Forever and ever.”

There is a story of fiddlers (really!) on a generation spaceship and the questions of importance of history and memory versus moving on, leaving past behind when you have few choices that the previous generations haven’t already made for you (“Wind Will Rove”), and a story of leaving memory and PTSD behind, for better or worse (“Remembery Day”).

“There’s a story about my grandmother Windy, one I never asked her to confirm or deny, in which she took her fiddle on a spacewalk.”

“Our Lady of the Open Road” is a story set in the world of her (so far) only novel A Song for a New Day, a world written to be post-epidemic and post-terrorism dystopian, which has some unsettling parallels to the current during-pandemic world of ours. Life imitates art, I guess?

The runner-up for my favorite story in this collection is “In Joy, Knowing the Abyss Behind”, a story of love and life and family and loss, and the reasons why a person may suddenly stop reaching for the metaphorical stars - all with the subtlest hint of SF at one point, giving it unexpected poignancy. This one certainly grabbed me and made me realize that yes, I *am* a fan of Pinsker.

“He was the draftsman, but she knew plants. They started with the roots. She guided him through the shape of the tree, through the shape of his penance. Through every branch they both knew by heart, through every platform she had seen from her vantage point in the garden. The firehouse pole, the puppet theater, the Rapunzel tower. The crow’s nest, which had kept his secret. Finally, around the treehouse, they started on her plans for the spring’s gardens. All that mattered was his hand pressed in hers: long enough to feel like always, long enough to feel like everything trapped had been set free.”

And the absolute crown jewel for me was the Hugo and Nebula and Locus nominee “And Then There Were [N-One]”, a wonderful novella that I wish never had to end. A “locked hotel” murder mystery, with the victim and the murderer and the detective and all the suspects being Sarah Pinsker - or rather many variations of her multiple alternate reality selves in the true multiverse quantum fashion.

“Who discovers how to access infinite realities and then uses that discovery to invite her alternate selves to a convention?”

I don’t think I would have enjoyed these stories as much had I read them separately, as standalones, with the exception of my favorites “And Then There Were N-One” and “In Joy, Knowing the Abyss Behind”, but reading them as a collection weaves a certain charm and cohesiveness and appreciation that short story collections can often lack. The only miss for me was “The Narwhal”, the story that I could not connect with no matter what, but the other twelve are pretty darn good.

4 stars (rounding up just a bit). I’ll be on the lookout for her works from now on.

[Майя Ставитская · Rating 5 out of 5]

According to the results of Hugo 2021 announced yesterday, Sarah Pinsker's story "Two Truths and a Lie" became the winner. And this story was a finalist of Nebula 2016, and I love her "Our Lady of the Open Road". They have sincerity and simplicity, close attention to the little ones of this world, and no show-off. Her simple honest stories give the joy of absolute recognition, which you experience when reading Mark Twain, Jack London, O.Henry, Steinbeck - the feeling that you have come into contact with the present.

Something happened on Earth that broke the fragile balance of our life at once. It only seems that a man with his claim to be the king of the universe is omnipotent. In fact, the planet can shake us off like a dog shaking off a flea - without even noticing. Something happened and now there is no Internet, no cellular connection, no electricity, no other communications. and there is an endless seashore, along which you wander, looking for food and firewood; from time to time bumping into drowned people (every time you turn over and look into the face, if there's still something left to look into, hoping that it's not Deborah). And for some reason you drag her guitar along with the meager belongings that fate has left you. Another discarded body belongs to a rock star and... it's still alive.

Раньше или позже все падает в море
По объявленным вчера результатам Хьюго 2021, рассказ Сары Пинскер "Две правды и ложь" (Two Truths and a Lie) стал лауреатом. А этот рассказ был финалистом Небьюлы 2016, и я люблю ее "Our Lady of the Open Road" ("Наша Леди Большой дороги"). В них искренность и простота, пристальное внимание к малым мира сего, и никакого выпендрежа. Ее простые честные истории дарят радость абсолютного узнавания, какую исытываешь читая Марка Твена, Джека Лондона, О.Генри, Стейнбека - ощущение, что соприкоснулась с настоящим.

Что-то случилось на Земле, что враз сломало хрупкое равновесие нашей жизни. Это ведь только кажется, что человек с его претензией быть царем вселенной, всемогущ. На деле, планета может стряхнуть нас себя, как отряхивающаяся собака блоху - даже не заметив. Что-то случилось и нет теперь ни интернета, ни сотовой связи, ни электричества, никаких других коммуникаций. а есть бесконечный берег моря, по которому ты бредешь, отыскивая съестное и топляк; время от времени натыкаясь на утопленников (всякий раз переворачиваешь и заглядываешь в лицо, если там еще осталось, во что заглядывать, надеясь, что это не Дебора). И зачем-то тащишь за собой ее гитару вместе со скудными пожитками, которые оставила тебе судьба. Очередное выброшенное тело принадлежит рок-звезде и... оно еще живое.

Габби Роббинс была умной девушкой. И талантливой. И кое-чего сумела уже добиться в музыкальной индустрии. Потому, когда устроители Звездного Ковчега (что-то витало в воздухе, знаете, ощущение, что надо сливаться из этого ощетинившегося ядовитыми иглами мира куда-нибудь в тропический рай). Так вот, устроители тура предложили ей, в составе группы, место на корабле. Нет, не почетными гостями - аниматорами, призванными развлекать звездную публику, Габи была рада по уши. Еще бы - тот же тур, только без горестей и невзгод Большой дороги, все оплачено, да еще селебрити кругом. И пусть Мир загибается, мы пересидим коллапс в райском уголке. Кто же знал, что корабль вдруг возьмет и потонет. Кто знал, что шлюпка, в которую удастся впрыгнуть, утонет тоже. А все, что оставит тебе судьба - быть найденной женщиной-мусорщицей на морском берегу, умирая от холода.

Sooner or later everything falls into the sea небольшой рассказ и ничего эпохального в нем не происходит. Одна женщина находит другую, спасает, какое-то время они идут вместе, потом молоденькая и самоуверенная сбегает, прихватив гитару, которую зачем-то несет с собой старшая - с гитарой она сумеет заработать себе на пропитание выбраться из этого странного места и добраться до цивилизации. Дальше все такие же обыденные вещи, но это светит изнутри тем светом который умеет давать настоящая литература.

[Iona Sharma · Rating 5 out of 5]

It took me a while to warm to this one because a couple of the earlier stories didn't grab me - including, disappointingly, the title story, which I didn't hate but didn't love. But when it picks up steam, it's a really wonderful book. The hands-down best story is "And Then There Were N-1", the Hugo-nominated story about a convention full of the author's alternative universe selves - all called Sarah Pinsker, attending SarahCon - but I liked "Wind Will Rove" almost as much, which is a story about generation ships and history, Cape Breton Gaelic music and òrain luaidh. All the stories are intelligent and kind and worth reading, though, and it's a really solid collection.

[Beige · Rating 5 out of 5]

Its official, I'm a Sarah Pinsker fan. I kind of wish there was a real SarahCon where us fans could congregate with our homemade fan t-shirts and badges with the titles of our favorite Pinsker short stories.

Each story has an interesting SciFi or fantasy twist, but it's the characters and the 'slice of life' vibe that kept me so rapt. I really liked them all, but together they made something rather special.

I couldn't pick a favourite, but the opener A Stretch of Highway Two Lanes Wide really tickled me.

[Lori · Rating 5 out of 5]

Most definitely in the running for best book I've read this year. Wow. Just wow.

Sarah deftly captures the human experience and rocks our world, time and time again in Sooner or Later Everything Falls Into the Sea. The stories within this collection take place in alternate universes and future versions of our current world, where the characters' realities are near enough to our own to seem comforting and familiar, yet are bizarre enough to catch you off-guard and continously facinate you.

It's rare that I read a collection so well balanced. There's not a story here that I didn't like and so many that I absolutely adored, making it difficult to pick a favorite. In the opening story "A Stretch of Highway Two Lanes Wide" a young man loses his arm and has it replaced with a robotic prosthetic, but there's a problem. Instead of seeing an arm, he sees a road in Colorado in its place. In the title story, a rock star washes up on a secluded island and she's rescued by a grouchy scavenger with a massive chip on her shoulder. "Taking with Dead People" tells the story of two best friends who launch a successful business crafting model murder houses, complete with AI technology that can respond with factual and presumptive data, until one of their own haunted pasts are replicated. "Wind Will Rove" follows the re-creation of the history of a song, after a 'blackout' on a spaceship filled with generations of hopeful people headed to a new planet wipes out most of the ship's historical databases. And in the final story "And Then There Were (N-One)", we're treated to a delightful Agatha Christie homage, in which hundreds of Sarah Pinsker's (yes, the author) are invited across multi-universes to attend a conference on a secluded island in the midst of a storm, and (yes) one of them ends up murdered.

Dazzling, daring, and fascinating, Sarah's stories leave a lasting impressing long after they've been read, stirring your heart as they swirl around in your head.

[Brooke · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't be truly objective about this book - Sarah is my friend. I remember when she sold her first story, and when she received her first award nomination. And now she has her first book release and every time award nominations for SFF awards come out my question isn't whether she was nominated but rather which story of hers was nominated this time.

But I can be objective enough to know that this collection competes with some of the best. I've read plenty of SFF short story collections - including Ted Chiang and Connie Willis and NK Jemisin - that swept me off my feet left me dazzled, and Sarah's belongs in their ranks. Sarah immediately drops the reader in the middle of a fully realized world and tells a story that is achingly human despite the fantastical settings, as all the best SFF does. Like all the greats, she creates so much with so few words, doing more in two dozen pages than many authors do in entire novels. These stories are sticky - the ones I read in the past stayed in the corners of my brain and the ones that are new to me are already sneaking up on me when I'm busy at work or reading other things. I can't recommend this collection enough.

[Jennifer]

Sarah Pinsker writes quirky, post-apocalyptic, slice-of-life kind of stories...of lives that hold no interest for me. I made it, with the grim determination born of this-is-my-last-unread-library-book, to all but the last two stories. Then I went to the library and got new books, and the desire to be done with this collection overcame my curiosity about the remaining stories.

The short fictions in Sooner or Later Everything Falls into the Sea vary quite a lot in setting, but the majority take place in vaguely post-apocalyptic worlds with an elegiac eye on memory, loss, and resilience. The speculative part of Pinsker's fiction is very little concerned with the how - there is virtually no interest in ecology or science or non-human beings - and very much concerned with what humans are feeling about the new state of things, whether it's a bionic arm that seems to have its own memories, or growing up second generation on a spaceship, or making a stand as one of the last touring musicians on Earth.

It's all just way too people-y for me. I understand that this is an unfair criticism (most books are about people, after all), but I feel acutely claustrophobic in Pinsker's anthropocentric worlds and concerns. I perked up when I came to a story that had a botanist in it ('In Joy, Knowing the Abyss Behind'), but there are no plants in here other than a tree used as scaffolding for a treehouse, and the botanist character could have as easily been a phlebotomist, which is what someone thought I said when I told her I was a botanist.

It surely doesn't help that I can't identify with the many musicians in these pages, having failed my level 2 piano exams after years of sullenly enduring lessons in something I had neither interest nor aptitude in. And I actually can't think of a story that would appeal less to me than that of a childless woman who wants a child so badly that she implodes her own life for it ('And We Were Left Darkling').

Competently and often imaginatively written, I'll give you that. But 100% not for me.

[Camelia Rose · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thanks to the GR friend who recommended Sarah Pinsker to me. I totally enjoyed this short story collection. The rare warmth inside each story is welcoming, in contrast to several other sci-fi collections I’ve read recently.

My favorites:

Sooner Or Later Everything Falls into the Sea
In an unidentified dystopian world, a lonely forager survives by picking up debris from the sea while patiently waiting to be reunited with her loved one, until one day an unexpected bass player washed up on the shore.

The Low Hum of Her
A daughter and father escape (the holocaust?) with the robotic grandma built by the father. This one reminds me of a Ken Liu steampunk story.

No Lonely Seafarer
A retelling of Homer’s Siren, but from the person who breaks the spell.

Wind Will Rove
In a space voyage that takes many generations to complete, how do each new generation find the meaning of life and purpose of the voyage? Do parents have rights to determine the fate for their children and grandchildren? What’s the point of learning the history of a world you can never return to?

A Stretch of Highway Two Lanes Wide
A cute story of a prosthetic implant who gains a personality

And Then There Were (N-One)
Another multiverse story. A story about the road not taken, regret, fate, etc…, well-realized.

Our Lady of the Open Road
This one hit home hard because of the Covid. In a post-apocalyptic world, the physical world has become so unsafe and so restricted that live music performances are almost obsolete, except for a few defiant travel punk bands and their diehard fans.


A bonus point is the recurrent thread of music in various stories, as music is probably the most important art form to me and my mental health.

[Vanessa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Possibly the best short story collection I have ever read.

I won't break it down by story, but I have to make one. Specific. Comment.

"A dog-eared paperback novel called Parable of the Trickster."

GODDAMMIT SARAH

[Matt Quann · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though the comparison isn't entirely apt, Sarah Pinsker's award-winning collection has the thought and texture that you'd expect from Ted Chiang. Rather than Chiang's ornate thought experiments made fiction, Pinsker dials in on the human aspects and consequences of technological and societal change. They're small personal stories within a much wider world that had me mentally peeking around corners to get a glimpse of what else was out there.

Memory, music, human connection, and our experience of the world are themes that resonate through the entire collection. Whether it is a story about an interstellar seed ship that has lost all of its Earth-related media or a rag-tag bunch of punk rockers fighting against technological obsolescence, it is the impact on the characters that matters most to Pinsker. I found almost all of the stories to be intriguing concepts and I like the subtle nudges and overt demonstrations of Pinsker's philosophies of community and existence.

I'll definitely be reading more from Pinsker and I'd be interested to see how she manages a full-length novel. Some of these stories are so perfect in their brevity that it'd be a shame to have one overstay its welcome. All the same, Sooner or Later Everything Falls Into the Sea is a winner for speculative and literary fiction readers alike.

[4.5 stars]

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an impressive collection of stories, many set in the near-future or an alternate universe, but also grounded in real human dilemmas, including loss and isolation. The last story, "And Then There Were None", possibly the best in the collection, is a tribute to Agatha Christie, about a conference of hundreds of Sarah Pinskers, (the author) on a remote island in a storm--and one of them is murdered. The writing here is strong and deft and I am definitely looking forward to read more of Pinsker.

[Nadine in California · Rating 5 out of 5]

I settled into each of these stories like a big, comfy chair. Not because they were cozy or didn't ask much of me (sometimes quite the opposite) but because they immersed me fully into their worlds right from the start. There are some very creative worlds here, and I think the stories I liked best were ones that didn't have dramatic plot turns, but had characters I felt strong connections to. I can't really pick out a favorite, they're all strong, but "In Joy, Knowing the Abyss Behind" plucked every heart string, and "Wind Will Rove" has a special place in my heart because it's about "Old Time" music (aboard a space ship!), which I've dipped an untalented toe into, fiddle-wise. "The Narwhal" was fun. But every story is a keeper.

[Hannah · Rating 5 out of 5]

What an incredible collection. I loved this. No wonder she's an award darling, very much deservedly so.

[Peter Tillman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rating and review solely for the stories that follow. I haven't seen the whole collection, but all but 3 stories are available online. The stories I read range from first-rate to one I didn't care for. Overall, a 3 star average for the stories I read. It's hard to rate a collection.

For a more enthusiastic (and better) review of the whole collection, see Natalya's: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

The Best: 3 stars or higher ratings
• "Wind Will Rove"(2017), novelette. https://sarahpinsker.com/files/WindWi... Hugo and Nebula nominations for Best Novelette, 2018.
This is a fresh look at a very old sfnal story device, the generation starship, which goes back at least to Konstantin Tsiolkovsky: http://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/...
Sarah Pinsker's fresh twist is to look at old-time fiddle music on her starship. Her protagonist's grandmother was a fiddler, and so is her granddaughter, who doubles as ship's historian, and triples as a tenth-grade teacher. There's an appealing lived-in quality to Pinsker's future, and I liked this story a lot. 4.5 stars, highly recommended.
• And Then There Were (N – One) (2017) , novella. https://uncannymagazine.com/article/a... Hugo and Nebula nominees for Best Novella, 2018. SarahCon! The ultimate Mary Sue! *Hundreds * of yourself, or close iterations, from around the multiverse…. The story starts out well. The protagonist Sarah, an insurance investigator, is asked to look into a mysterious death. And I think I’ll stop there, except to say that I thought the story ran on a bit too long, and I wasn’t quite happy with the ending. But you should read it, and judge for yourself. I’m giving it 3.5 stars, rounded up.
• No Lonely Seafarer • (2014) • short story. https://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fi...
Fantasy about Sirens (as in Ulysses) who have closed a port town with their fatal songs. Alex, an intersex boy/girl, manages to break the spell. Nicely done, 3.5 stars.
• "Sooner or Later Everything Falls Into the Sea," 2016, novelette. Story link: https://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fi... Nebula Nomination for Best Novelette 2016. Previously read. End of the world/post-apocalypse story. Gosh, this is a pretty grim one. But well done! Not reread this time. 3 stars, by memory.
• "A Stretch of Highway Two Lanes Wide" (2014), short story. https://escapepod.org/2015/06/27/ep49... Nebula Nomination for Best Short Story 2014. A young man loses his arm in a farm-machinery accident. He gets an experimental, cybernetic prosthetic arm that thinks it's a highway in eastern Colorado! Slice of life story, works better than it sounds. 3 stars.
• In Joy, Knowing the Abyss Behind (2013), novelette. Nebula Nomination for Best Novelette 2013. http://strangehorizons.com/fiction/in... An elderly retired architect has had a stroke. His longtime wife reviews there life together. A poignant story, that has a small SF element. Weak 3 stars.

The Also-rans: 2.5 stars or less
• "Remembery Day" (2015), short story. https://apex-magazine.com/remembery-day/
A Veteran's Day celebration, when the mysterious Veil is lifted for the day. The vets can then remember what they did in the war, for good or ill. Huh. 2.5 stars.
• "The Sewell Home for the Temporally Displaced" (2014), short story. https://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fi... Fantasy vignette set in an old folks' home. Eh, 2 stars.
• "And We Were Left Darkling" (2015) • short story. http://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fic... Confusing fantasy about "dream children" and homeless people on the beach in California. Huh. 1.5 stars. Not for me.

TOC & story sources: http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?7...
More of Sarah Pinsker's stories available online: https://www.freesfonline.net/authors/...

[Beth Cato · Rating 5 out of 5]

I received this galley through LibraryThing Early Reviewers.

Sarah Pinsker is among my favorite writers, and I was thrilled to read her new collection from Small Beer Press a few months in advance of release. When I say she's among my favorites, that also means I'd read most of the stories in this book before; four were new to me, but one sees its first publication in this book.

All of these stories are worth re-reading. Actually, they are worth studying on a technical level to understand why stories work. Pinsker doesn't write about big drama. She writes about people being people in sometimes extraordinary circumstances. There's a sense of subtlety to her works. In "A Stretch of Highway Two Lanes Wide," a man loses his arm, and along with his prosthetic he gains an awareness of being a road in remote Colorado. "Remembery Day" addresses PTSD and the effects of war on the next generation, without ever becoming preachy. In "And Then There were (n-one)," one of my very favorite novellas, period, she brings a brilliant spin to Agatha Christie's "And Then There Were None" by envisioning a cross-dimensional conference of hundreds of Sarah Pinskers on an isolated island in a storm--and one of them is murdered.

Because of this collection, I started my document to track my favorite 2019 releases to nominate for awards in 2020. Yes, this collection is that good.

[David H. · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've only read a few stories by Sarah Pinsker before, two of which were included in this collection. Now having read this, I can say that I really, really like Sarah's work. In this book, there was only one story (out of thirteen) that I wasn't exactly fond of, and a full half of these were stories I loved. They're all SF or fantasy stories, though several add historical bents (and one of my favorites adds a murder mystery).

I won't mention every story, but I do want to mention my favorites: "And Then There Were (N-One)" (murder mystery at a convention full of Sarahs), "In Joy, Knowing the Abyss Behind" (probably the most emotional story for me), "Wind Will Rove" (really made me think about generation ships), "Our Lady of the Open Road" (just loved the setting and characters), and "The Low Hum of Her" (a golem grandma! "Bosoms," indeed). I also want to mention "A Stretch of Highway Two Lanes Wide" which was strange, but touching. The only story original to this book was "The Narwhal" which is both funny, strange, and evocative.

A lot of these stories are freely available online from their original publications, but I highly encourage people to get this collection.

[Amy Biggart · Rating 4 out of 5]

That last story was INCREDIBLE. There were a few others I loved, and a lot more that I liked or felt ambivalent about. Seriously the last story is called “And Then There Were (N-One)” google it and read it please. Four stars and change.

[Jennifer · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is easily the best short story collection--and possibly the best book--I read in the last year. So often, collections are a mixed bag, but this one was weird and wondrous from beginning to end.

I appreciated the hope that threaded throughout the stories. I've been working against the urge to make every work of science fiction into a brooding vision of an ominous future, and Pinsker's book gives me a rare model for this amidst the bleak, dystopian SF landscape. I also enjoyed the abundance of queer characters, whose presence made even the most strange worlds feel familiar, as if they could be my home, too.

I found myself wanting to talk about nearly every story as I read it--the questions that each one posed struck like clappers against the bell of my brain, so that I found myself ringing them out into every conversation over this last month. I particularly loved "Remembery Day" and "Wind Will Rove," which both reckon with what we choose to remember and what we want to forget. Despite that similarity, each comes at those questions from strikingly different angles. The first asks whether forgetting wartime trauma is worth the cost of sacrificing one's broader memory. The other wonders whether--once we've left this world behind forever--the collective memory of Earth's history is a necessity or a burden, a way of preventing the repetition of terrible mistakes or a barrier to possibility and progress.

Another favorite was "Our Lady of the Open Road," which helped me think about making art in late-stage capitalism. Although this sounds like a lofty subject, Pinsker grounds it in the grit and grime of a punk band driving their van from one city to the next, trying to keep live music thriving in a world where hologram performances are ubiquitous and easily enjoyed from the comfort of home.

When I arrived at the final story, I was dubious, wondering, "How will she sustain this momentum? What could possibly top the stories that have come before?" But "And Then There Were (N-One)" is hands down the best in the book, with its homage to Agatha Christie and its bizarre convening of the many Sarah Pinskers that exist across multiple worlds. Pinsker-the-author navigates the craft of the story--in which all the characters are nearly identical--with humor and grace. On top of that, the story gives bodies to so many questions about how choice and coincidence accumulate to make us who we are, and opens the door to the many selves we might be, if only something had been slightly different.

P.S. After typing up a review of this book, I hit “Save,” only to encounter the whirling spiral of doom, followed by a blank screen. How much do I love this book? So much that I spent the next half hour recreating my original review from memory, in the off chance that reading a few more good words about this collection might someday tip someone in favor of buying a copy.

[Kyle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Will update rating after bookclub discussion 😊

[Ed Erwin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I greatly enjoyed many of the stories in here. Yet, after reaching the end, I realized I'd forgotten what most of them were about! Maybe they all bleed into each other because they are all character-driven and some of the characters seem a lot alike. The characters are well-written and real-seeming, though.

The title story is probably my favorite: just two women dealing with a post-apocalyptic world. "Wind will rove", about fiddle players on a generation ship was also really nice. It makes one think again about how much do we really need to learn from history? and where is the balance between preservation and innovation. "Our lady of the open road" went on too long for me. I concerns the day-to-day struggles of a punk band on tour in an old, decrepit van. Somewhere between the pages of that story a mysterious white powder fell out of the library book. Maybe if I'd snorted it I'd've enjoyed the story more. The final story, "And Then There Were N-One" is clever, but I personally have little love for alternate-reality stories.

[Koeeoaddi · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a brilliant collection; vivid, compelling and relentlessly humane. Each story sucks you in with an intriguing first sentence or premise and by the time you turn the page you are completely involved. I love the language, which is so evocative and immediate. There wasn't a story I didn't like, or a sentence out of place. I loved the title story, but I think my favorite was the short and lovely The Sewell Home for tbe Temporally Displaced. Marvelous!

[L (Nineteen Adze) · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection is a strong 4 stars for me. It's especially impressive for a debut collection and makes me interested to try Lost Places, her next collection. Overall, I'd describe these stories as living somewhere between melancholy and hopeful, full of bittersweet longing and uncertainty. The endings are good crossroads or pausing points, but there's no tight bow around a moral conclusion: the slightly open-ended nature of these endings has left several of them lingering in my head afterwards.

The light negatives: A few stories didn't quite land for me, and it doesn't have the kind of author-discussion material that often elevates a collection for me. I love seeing authors write a bit (even just a single page or a few paragraphs) about the seed/ inspiration for each story, or which was the first one they sold, or the relationships between stories, and there's none of that here, just a short acknowledgements section. The stories also aren't in publication order by year, which can be another interesting organizational system to show a growth in skill or change in style.

Time to get into the individual stories.

"A Stretch of Highway Two Lanes Wide"-- the interplay between a man who's never left home and the phantom sensations of elsewhere after an accident are lovely. It's an intriguing setup, and Pinsker has a real eye for establishing mood and character in a small space. Not sure I adorde this one, but the atmosphere is great.
Available online: https://escapepod.org/2015/06/27/ep49...

"And We Were Left Darkling"-- this story is more blur-edged and surreal, dealing with infertility and impossible dreams. Something about it reminds me of an older Le Guin or Bradbury story, though I'd have trouble pinpointing which one-- there's something about the half-dreamed reality and mass inexplicable action that just has an older style. Very unsettling.
Available online: https://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fi...

"Remembery Day"-- there's some impressive emotional depth in a small space with an exploration of honoring the shape of a war while letting veterans vote about whether to remember its details. We see traces of PTSD, lost memories, old pain, and the compounding hurt of missing something you can't remember, or never know. It's moving stuff, and as I wrapped up the third story, I started catching trends: Pinsker has a real interest in memory and in longing for complicated things you may not be able to have.
Available online: https://apex-magazine.com/short-ficti...

"Sooner or Later Everything Falls Into the Sea" -- the title story is deeply melancholy and does some clever things with POV to shift reader expectations. I thought this story was going in one clear direction and got something with less closure and deeper characterization. The imagery of claustrophobic life on ships feels like a cousin to Valente's The Past Is Red and its garbage islands.
Available online: https://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fi...

"The Low Hum of Her"-- a beautiful and understated story focused on a young girl who at first resents the automaton made to mirror her dead grandmother. The cultural and historical context here feels so rich because it pulls just the right level of detail to evoke time and place (of Jews fleeing oppression around WWII) without loading the story down with too much detail for the young narrator. Great exploration of family, legacy, and memory.
Printed in Asimov's and later in an anthology.

"Talking with Dead People"-- this one lives at the intersection of true crime, AI, ethics, and memories too painful to discuss. I thought I saw one twist coming, but in beautiful style, the story went for a quieter and more bittersweet conclusion.
Printed in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction.

"In Joy, Knowing the Abyss Behind"-- fascinating character study of a marriage, a love letter to weird architecture, and sort of an outsider POV on strange happenings. I'm left with questions, but in a way that generally works. Pinsker has a real knack for restraint: she builds up tension and then resolves it into one moment rather than tying it up in too tight a bow.
Available online: http://strangehorizons.com/fiction/in...

"No Lonely Seafarer"-- The story of young Alex trying to get past sirens is competently written, but I never felt truly surprised or gripped by this one. The outline of it was a bit too visible from the first page or two. It's one of the earliest stories in the collection, though not the earliest ("In Joy, Knowing the Abyss Behind" is from a year earlier)-- to me, though, this one feels more like a tentative journeyman project when compared to the rest.
Available online: https://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fi...

"Wind Will Rove"-- a fantastic character study set on a generation ship where only a few people still remember Earth. This one has a light touch exploring legacy, memory, music, what it means to create, and what gives any moment significance. Once again, Pinsker put just enough of a potential intrigue plot to chase that I kept looking for that story until the real core came forward. Gorgeous stuff.
Printed in Asimov's and later in another anthology.

"Our Lady of the Open Road"-- the bittersweet story of one of the last live-music punk bands hanging on in an era of holographic shows. I love the setup and several small details without adoring it the way I have some of these others. I appreciate the way it's a love letter to touring bands and live music, though. I'm not sure how much I would like this one on its own, but it's a nice accompaniment to "Wind Will Rove" in the way they both reflect on live music, group performance, and art as a living thing.
Printed in Asimov's and later in another anthology.

"The Narwhal"-- a charmingly little road-trip story about a freelancer who gets hired to help drive a whale-shaped car across the country. I think I wanted a pinch more of either backstory or present-day development of the character relationships, but the writing is lovely.
First available in this collection.

"And Then There Were (N-One)"-- this is the one I'd heard the most about before picking up the collection. A clever structure that starts as a detective story about who killed one alternate self among hundreds but is also a thoughtful look at the many possible roads not taken. I would have loved to get longer looks at a few more Sarahs to complicate the mystery (this would be a fantastic *long* novella), but this was great fun to explore. The last few paragraphs of uncertainty are absolutely killer stuff and really made the story for me.
Available online: https://www.uncannymagazine.com/artic...

All in all, a good collection of stories. Almost all of them left me thinking "this is so interesting and I'd love to see more of Pinsker's work," which is a great place for a debut collection to be.

//
This is a really strong collection-- I'll collect my detailed thoughts on each story next week (short version is that not every story hit for me, but there are some gems here). For now, I just want to note that Pinsker excels at establishing setting in a small space and that there's a great melancholy-but-hopeful tone running through these stories. RTC.

[Miloš Petrik · Rating 4 out of 5]

Much as I wasn't thrilled with the initial half of this collection, I was very impressed with the latter. The closing story in particular, "And Then There Were N-One" was a really interesting read, and, I imagine, a lot of fun to write.

[Rahma]

List of stories:
1. A Stretch of Highway Two Lanes Wide
2. And We Were Left Darkling => Started out really interested, but the conclusion left me with no real resolution. Still a nice story, though.
3. Remembery Day
4. Sooner or Later Everything Falls Into the Sea
5. The Low Hum of Her
6. Talking With Dead People
7. The Sewell Home for the Temporally Displaced => Really cool, really short story. Worth a re-read to notice all the small details in such a short page time.
8. In Joy, Knowing the Abyss Behind
9. No Lonely Seafarer
10. Wind Will Rove
11. Our Lady of the Open Road
12. The Narwhal
13. And Then There Were N-One => Wow. This was enthralling - I was laughing on the bus as I was starting this story, and thanks to the mask on my face, it wasn't so obvious. This is one of the longer stories in this collection. The multiverse exists and doppelgangers of the scientist who discovered them are invited for a convention to meet the others. Then one ends up dead, and it's up to our main character to figure things out. This story kept me engaged all the way through as I was trying to put together the killer's identity with our protagonist. There were enough clues to make the ending worth it. As a reader, I pieced out a part of the mystery but was also left speechless by another, and I loved it! If you won't read the whole anthology, at least check this story out.

[Kim Lockhart · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 ⭐ rounded up. This is maybe the most unusual set of short stories I've ever read. I wasn't even sure how I felt about them, until I got about a third of the way in, and got hooked. The stories seemed to get better and better, exponentially.

The imagination here is off the charts, and the style is not quite like any other author I can think of. One of my parameters for giving out a high rating is whether anyone else could have written it. I submit that these stories are completely unique, creative, and have a way of getting the gears in your head turning in new ways.

I'm looking forward to reading more by this author, to see how she further shapes and stretches her ideas.

Thanks to Beige for introducing me to this author.

[N a N D O R · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5/5
Con esta serie de relatos Sarah Pinsker se ha puesto muy arriba entre mis autoras favoritos.
casi todas las historias se pueden leer gratis en internet y tres de ellas las puedes conseguir en español:
-Un Tramo de carretera de dos carriles de ancho. Revista Axxón.
-Con alegría, conociendo el abismo que hay detrás. Revista Axxón.
-Hablar con los muertos. Cuentos para Algernon.

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow. At the end of the book, I just wanted more.

I'd previously read, and loved, about half of the stories here. The new one that I liked best was the last one, "And Then There Were (N-1)." It's about a conference of about 200 Sarah Pinskers (some have slightly different names) from alternate universes, and includes a murder mystery. Outstanding!

[Bee · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have no words beyond "wow" at the moment. Full review to come.

[CatBookMom · Rating 4 out of 5]

First impression: I am savoring those stories, reading them one at a time. Really good writing, characterizations, sense of place.

[Teleseparatist · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sarah Pinsker's talent continues to astonish me. These stories are so clever and tender in voice. Many of them take themes of more traditional sf but look at them from a different perspective: from the sidelines, where human lives go on and ethical choices also have to be made. I was familiar with some of these stories but not others, and it was a pleasure reading the new material.

The one exception to my enthusiasm was Our Lady of the Open Road, the story set in the holographic-musicians world, which I believe it shares with Pinsker's debut novel. It was competent and had some good moments, but just wasn't at all my thing, and confirmed my suspicion that Pinsker's novel might not be that interesting for me (alas).