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Ten Planets: Stories
A collection of fanciful, philosophical science fictions by “one of Mexico’s finest novelists” (Vulture).
The characters that populate Yuri Herrera’s surprising new story collection inhabit imagined futures that reveal the strangeness and instability of the present. Drawing on science fiction, noir, and the philosophical parables of Jorge Luis Borges’s Fictions and Italo Calvino’s Cosmicomics, these very short stories are an inspired extension of this significant writer’s work.
In Ten Planets, objects can be sentient and might rebel against the unhappy human family to which they are attached. A detective of sorts finds clues to buried secrets by studying the noses of his clients, which he insists are covert maps. A meager bacterium in a human intestine gains consciousness when a psychotropic drug is ingested. Monsters and aliens abound, but in the fiction of Yuri Herrera, knowing who is the monster and who the alien is a tricky proposition.
In Ten Planets, Herrera’s consistent themes—the mutability of borders, the wounds and legacy of colonial violence, and a deep love of storytelling in all its forms—are explored with evident brilliance and delight.
The characters that populate Yuri Herrera’s surprising new story collection inhabit imagined futures that reveal the strangeness and instability of the present. Drawing on science fiction, noir, and the philosophical parables of Jorge Luis Borges’s Fictions and Italo Calvino’s Cosmicomics, these very short stories are an inspired extension of this significant writer’s work.
In Ten Planets, objects can be sentient and might rebel against the unhappy human family to which they are attached. A detective of sorts finds clues to buried secrets by studying the noses of his clients, which he insists are covert maps. A meager bacterium in a human intestine gains consciousness when a psychotropic drug is ingested. Monsters and aliens abound, but in the fiction of Yuri Herrera, knowing who is the monster and who the alien is a tricky proposition.
In Ten Planets, Herrera’s consistent themes—the mutability of borders, the wounds and legacy of colonial violence, and a deep love of storytelling in all its forms—are explored with evident brilliance and delight.
112 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2019
90 people are currently reading
2041 people want to read
About the author
Yuri Herrera
30 books649 followersBorn in Actopan, Mexico, in 1970, Yuri Herrera studied Politics in Mexico, Creative Writing in El Paso and took his PhD in literature at Berkeley. His first novel to appear in English, Signs Preceding the End of the World, was published to great critical acclaim in 2015 and included in many Best-of-Year lists, including The Guardian‘s Best Fiction and NBC News’s Ten Great Latino Books, going on to win the 2016 Best Translated Book Award. He is currently teaching at the Tulane University, in New Orleans.
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April 29, 2023
"We're going to make it," she said.
It was a fragile and beautiful plural.
When imagining possible, far-flung futures, it is fascinating to consider how changes in cultural norms or values might make the future seem as bewildering or beguiling as technological advances do. Always reinventing and exploring new territories of literature, the thematically linked, short stories (most only a page or two in length) in Yuri Herrera’s Ten Planets harnesses his abilities to twist conventions or employ language in unexpected ways to produce elusive futures from which the reader feels alien and estranged once we recognize our expectations and ideas on reality might be vaguely incongruous with the existences on the page. It is a brilliant and destabilizing effect, moving through stories that feel adjacent to the whimsicality of Jorge Luis Borges’s philosophical parables blended with the sci-fi noir and paranoia vibes of Philip K. Dick. There are imaginative and threatening scenarios with an apocalypse born from the words ‘everyone is going away’ written on a notecard, an AI house has aims to trap it’s occupants, oppressors reincarnate their oppressed as rats, or people living entire lives under invisibility cloaks, and the characters are just as intriguing from a bored zookeeper in an alien zoo, a multi-limbed writer who works in a ‘story incubator lair’, to a man who can find lost objects using people’s noses as a map. Everything defies convention and while Herrera utilizes sci fi tropes, it is always in unexpected ways to create these little gems that evade easy interpretation and shine like distant stars in the sky: tiny and beautiful but feeling vaguely out of reach.
‘When you’re a pestilent creature, the world is no longer pestilent.’
Yuri Herrera is a fascinating author who is difficult to pin down, though an attempt at categorization feels beside the point to his works. In an interview with Latin American Literature Today, Herrera said ‘I don’t write thesis novels,’ and while his stories often have socio-political aspects permeating the themes, it is a much more emotional and nebulous center of gravity through which the themes revolve in its orbit. Each of his books has been a departure from the others, and have all been beautifully translated by Lisa Dillman(Signs Preceding the End of the World was winner of the 2016 Best Translated Book Award for Fiction). Ten Planets brings us into the realm of sci-fi, though in ways that are unexpected with each story a fresh surprise and—in keeping with his desire to never be a ‘thesis novel’—without any definitive “meaning” to the tales and images. We are all cosmic explorers in his words, and while it can be rather disorienting (and a bit of a slow read despite the very short length) it is an intriguing voyage.
‘And every little iota in his body began covering the endless iotas along the way.’
Herrera uses these stories to explore ideas of language, colonialism, and other social issues, though the predominant thread binding these stories is looking at how everything is the sum of infinite moments and actions. Each story looks at the infinitesimal bricks of reality all building together in each life, each gap between lives, and in each choice. Each ‘iota’ or reality. In her translator’s afterword, Dillman is given space to discuss her word choices and ideas behind the work (something I always love and wish publishers would do more often) and discusses Herrera’s use of the word ‘ápice’ which she translates as ‘iota’:
Dillman’s marvelous translation skills are really put to the test here as language is also a central theme and words often work in surprising ways here. There is, for instance, the choices she needed to make for certain technology and how the different connotations between tech terms would affect the interpretations. But we also see how much language is essential to culture in these stories and how much that also plays into issues of colonialism. An explorer finds himself suddenly murdered in one story when attempting to communicate as ‘attempting to usurp the person's most intimate of possessions--their unique and inimitable tongue--was interpreted as a heinous
act.’ Language is also used against each other in The Conspirators where two different human colonies (both from Earth but from different times) colonize the same planet, with one inevitably becoming the oppressor over the other by appropriating their language. Aspects of social inequalities and how they persist in these future worlds are all over the collection.
‘No, the grandiose and definitive could never be defined by the brief and simple and elementary.’
There is a fun, Borgesian whimsicality to many of these, most notably Zorg, Author of the Quixote which draws its title from a Borges story and involves an alien writing Dox Quixote. There are some charming ones, one where a character is chasing after an “Earthling” only for us to discover later he means a dog, a gut bacteria becomes sentient in another, or there is a favorite,The Cosmonaut, where a gift for using noses as a map leads to some awkward situations. Herrera has a few stories that tie together, such as the series about explorers looking for the end of the earth and only finding dragons, and even a darkly humorous story written as a User Agreement that nudges towards the anxieties of surveillance capitalism.
Everything is this collection is vaguely hostile, especially when it comes to hierarchies which are always tainted in violence. There are two stories titled The Objects, one of which deals with surveillance technology while the other is a corporate world where the higher up the chain you are, you become an animal higher up the foodchain. These stories are all rather playful and conceptually brilliant, though often rather dark and foreboding as well (The Monster’s Art, for instance, is about quite literally abusing “monster” in order for them to make art from their pain). What is most surprising, perhaps, is how tightly packed these are with Herrera constructing entire realities within the span of what is often two pages.
‘Earth must exist for the benefit of something else. Like sustenance. Earth as a host wafer, a tortilla, a cracker traveling through the universe, just awaiting an encounter with the mouth of the creator. and we are what imparts the flavor. Earth, to them, is concrete proof of divine cosmic pleasure.’
Philosophical and elusive, Ten Planets is a heady yet enthralling collection. While individual stories often don’t seem like much—a few I finished thinking “wait, what?” but unpacked them over the course of a few days—the amalgamation of ideas becomes a sum greater than its parts. Legacies of violence, oppression, language and cultural barriers, and all sorts of other boundaries become thematically linked as Herrera looks at the ways reality is the sum of tiny details, and it is in those details we find the true stories. Despite it’s short length this one took me a while to get through but it seemed best to only read a few at a time and give the ideas space to blossom in your mind as you grapple with them later. Herrera is an exciting author full of surprises and Ten Planets proves yet again he is a wizard of words.
3.5/5
‘Everybody knows that the Creator is not a mouth but the eye of a dragon, and that the world is but a blink, a blink, a blink set to happen: now.’
It was a fragile and beautiful plural.
When imagining possible, far-flung futures, it is fascinating to consider how changes in cultural norms or values might make the future seem as bewildering or beguiling as technological advances do. Always reinventing and exploring new territories of literature, the thematically linked, short stories (most only a page or two in length) in Yuri Herrera’s Ten Planets harnesses his abilities to twist conventions or employ language in unexpected ways to produce elusive futures from which the reader feels alien and estranged once we recognize our expectations and ideas on reality might be vaguely incongruous with the existences on the page. It is a brilliant and destabilizing effect, moving through stories that feel adjacent to the whimsicality of Jorge Luis Borges’s philosophical parables blended with the sci-fi noir and paranoia vibes of Philip K. Dick. There are imaginative and threatening scenarios with an apocalypse born from the words ‘everyone is going away’ written on a notecard, an AI house has aims to trap it’s occupants, oppressors reincarnate their oppressed as rats, or people living entire lives under invisibility cloaks, and the characters are just as intriguing from a bored zookeeper in an alien zoo, a multi-limbed writer who works in a ‘story incubator lair’, to a man who can find lost objects using people’s noses as a map. Everything defies convention and while Herrera utilizes sci fi tropes, it is always in unexpected ways to create these little gems that evade easy interpretation and shine like distant stars in the sky: tiny and beautiful but feeling vaguely out of reach.
‘When you’re a pestilent creature, the world is no longer pestilent.’
Yuri Herrera is a fascinating author who is difficult to pin down, though an attempt at categorization feels beside the point to his works. In an interview with Latin American Literature Today, Herrera said ‘I don’t write thesis novels,’ and while his stories often have socio-political aspects permeating the themes, it is a much more emotional and nebulous center of gravity through which the themes revolve in its orbit. Each of his books has been a departure from the others, and have all been beautifully translated by Lisa Dillman(Signs Preceding the End of the World was winner of the 2016 Best Translated Book Award for Fiction). Ten Planets brings us into the realm of sci-fi, though in ways that are unexpected with each story a fresh surprise and—in keeping with his desire to never be a ‘thesis novel’—without any definitive “meaning” to the tales and images. We are all cosmic explorers in his words, and while it can be rather disorienting (and a bit of a slow read despite the very short length) it is an intriguing voyage.
‘And every little iota in his body began covering the endless iotas along the way.’
Herrera uses these stories to explore ideas of language, colonialism, and other social issues, though the predominant thread binding these stories is looking at how everything is the sum of infinite moments and actions. Each story looks at the infinitesimal bricks of reality all building together in each life, each gap between lives, and in each choice. Each ‘iota’ or reality. In her translator’s afterword, Dillman is given space to discuss her word choices and ideas behind the work (something I always love and wish publishers would do more often) and discusses Herrera’s use of the word ‘ápice’ which she translates as ‘iota’:
‘Words are frequently polysemous, which is to say a single term may have multiple meanings. For example, in addition to the definitions listed above, ápice can also mean both tip (of your tongue, say) and apex (as in geometry: is that a science?). So the same word used several times in Spanish might be rendered many different ways in English…I have chosen to translate ápice as iota in English throughout Ten Planets. Everyinchiota of my being felt compelled not to stray from this lexical choice every time an ápice cropped up. In part because it is used in idiosyncratic ways in the Spanish. In part because aside from meaning "a tiny amount' and being the etymological root of "jot"), it has, to my ear, a more science-y ring than the other options and as such lends truthiness. But what is more, it refers explicitly to the ninth star in a constellation. It's a space-y word. Stellar in all respects.’
Dillman’s marvelous translation skills are really put to the test here as language is also a central theme and words often work in surprising ways here. There is, for instance, the choices she needed to make for certain technology and how the different connotations between tech terms would affect the interpretations. But we also see how much language is essential to culture in these stories and how much that also plays into issues of colonialism. An explorer finds himself suddenly murdered in one story when attempting to communicate as ‘attempting to usurp the person's most intimate of possessions--their unique and inimitable tongue--was interpreted as a heinous
act.’ Language is also used against each other in The Conspirators where two different human colonies (both from Earth but from different times) colonize the same planet, with one inevitably becoming the oppressor over the other by appropriating their language. Aspects of social inequalities and how they persist in these future worlds are all over the collection.
‘No, the grandiose and definitive could never be defined by the brief and simple and elementary.’
There is a fun, Borgesian whimsicality to many of these, most notably Zorg, Author of the Quixote which draws its title from a Borges story and involves an alien writing Dox Quixote. There are some charming ones, one where a character is chasing after an “Earthling” only for us to discover later he means a dog, a gut bacteria becomes sentient in another, or there is a favorite,The Cosmonaut, where a gift for using noses as a map leads to some awkward situations. Herrera has a few stories that tie together, such as the series about explorers looking for the end of the earth and only finding dragons, and even a darkly humorous story written as a User Agreement that nudges towards the anxieties of surveillance capitalism.
‘With this Authorization you consent to have any information about your use of the product utilized in but not limited to electoral campaigns, national security, meat product recycling, pharmaceutical experimentation, cosmetics research, psychological warfare, market studies, and collected prose.’
Everything is this collection is vaguely hostile, especially when it comes to hierarchies which are always tainted in violence. There are two stories titled The Objects, one of which deals with surveillance technology while the other is a corporate world where the higher up the chain you are, you become an animal higher up the foodchain. These stories are all rather playful and conceptually brilliant, though often rather dark and foreboding as well (The Monster’s Art, for instance, is about quite literally abusing “monster” in order for them to make art from their pain). What is most surprising, perhaps, is how tightly packed these are with Herrera constructing entire realities within the span of what is often two pages.
‘Earth must exist for the benefit of something else. Like sustenance. Earth as a host wafer, a tortilla, a cracker traveling through the universe, just awaiting an encounter with the mouth of the creator. and we are what imparts the flavor. Earth, to them, is concrete proof of divine cosmic pleasure.’
Philosophical and elusive, Ten Planets is a heady yet enthralling collection. While individual stories often don’t seem like much—a few I finished thinking “wait, what?” but unpacked them over the course of a few days—the amalgamation of ideas becomes a sum greater than its parts. Legacies of violence, oppression, language and cultural barriers, and all sorts of other boundaries become thematically linked as Herrera looks at the ways reality is the sum of tiny details, and it is in those details we find the true stories. Despite it’s short length this one took me a while to get through but it seemed best to only read a few at a time and give the ideas space to blossom in your mind as you grapple with them later. Herrera is an exciting author full of surprises and Ten Planets proves yet again he is a wizard of words.
3.5/5
‘Everybody knows that the Creator is not a mouth but the eye of a dragon, and that the world is but a blink, a blink, a blink set to happen: now.’
April 27, 2023
We’re always on opposite ends of the universe.
I have never before read stories so able to embody, to convey the alienation, the strangeness, the abandonment that are their central motives, the way the stories in this book do. Everything feels new, strange, detached here, and Herrera introduces us to truly extraordinary ideas and truly alien planets – bacteria which gain consciousness, copulation as language, murderous smart homes, man eating monsters, wild bureaucracies, lonely post-cataclysmic landscapes – but always as a commentary on our own planet and its inhabitants.
The stories are often extremely short, even for short stories, but make up in substance for what they don’t provide in length. You could easily sit a whole evening and think about what Herrera has compressed into one and a half pages. Surely not for everyone but very enjoyable for some, certainly for me.
I also really enjoyed the translator’s note revealing some difficulties or rather peculiarities, of translating Herrera, it was interesting and amusing.
I have never before read stories so able to embody, to convey the alienation, the strangeness, the abandonment that are their central motives, the way the stories in this book do. Everything feels new, strange, detached here, and Herrera introduces us to truly extraordinary ideas and truly alien planets – bacteria which gain consciousness, copulation as language, murderous smart homes, man eating monsters, wild bureaucracies, lonely post-cataclysmic landscapes – but always as a commentary on our own planet and its inhabitants.
The stories are often extremely short, even for short stories, but make up in substance for what they don’t provide in length. You could easily sit a whole evening and think about what Herrera has compressed into one and a half pages. Surely not for everyone but very enjoyable for some, certainly for me.
I also really enjoyed the translator’s note revealing some difficulties or rather peculiarities, of translating Herrera, it was interesting and amusing.
October 21, 2024
3.5 stars
short review for busy readers:
A unique collection of 20 flash fiction pieces from famed Mexican author Yuri Herrera. The stories start with distorted, metaphorical versions of everyday events and work their way gradually into experimental science fiction.
While the stories are well written and composed, they are all strange and unusual, even if you can clearly make out what Herrera is actually getting at behind all the masks he's put over everything.
This is one of those collections that you have to read slowly, bite by bite. Leave time for some contemplation after each morsel as you'll be full very quickly with plenty to think about. Only for fans of experimental or highly metaphoric works.
My faves were:
The Science of Extinction
House Taken Over
The Objects 2
Inventory of Human Diversity
Warning
and
Consolidation of Spirits...which just might be one of the best ghost stories I've ever read.
short review for busy readers:
A unique collection of 20 flash fiction pieces from famed Mexican author Yuri Herrera. The stories start with distorted, metaphorical versions of everyday events and work their way gradually into experimental science fiction.
While the stories are well written and composed, they are all strange and unusual, even if you can clearly make out what Herrera is actually getting at behind all the masks he's put over everything.
This is one of those collections that you have to read slowly, bite by bite. Leave time for some contemplation after each morsel as you'll be full very quickly with plenty to think about. Only for fans of experimental or highly metaphoric works.
My faves were:
The Science of Extinction
House Taken Over
The Objects 2
Inventory of Human Diversity
Warning
and
Consolidation of Spirits...which just might be one of the best ghost stories I've ever read.
May 3, 2023
it was history, turning tail to tales in its own experimentation. a spy might turn the tables. minutiae form oceans dead in their wave-formatted tracks. in an iota, we are on another ship bound for a dead zone that tracks its own progress via another species. words are precious, language sublime while incomprehensible to most. be an interpreter and follow the automatic screen. there are sonic winds around the corner. find your niche and let go.
July 29, 2020
Creo que el libro de relatos Diez planetas (2019) no ha sido una buena elección para comenzar con Yuri Herrera (1970-) un autor al que quería conocer desde hace tiempo.
Me he encontrado con un texto demasiado personal. Historias atrevidas, a veces electrizantes y sorprendentes, pero otras muchas demasiado crípticas, incomprensibles. Mezcla de creencias e imaginación desbordante, repleto de imágenes y alegorías y narrado con un léxico culto.
En cualquier caso lo he leído sin desagrado (como creo que lo harán los lectores que busquen algo más que pasar el rato) porque la prosa es elaborada y original, pero realmente no he llegado a entender las intenciones del autor y creo que el formato cuento, salvo ciertos toques de sorpresa, no está demasiado logrado, sobre todo los finales. Yo, al menos, hubiera necesitado un poco más de comprensión para disfrutarlos realmente.
Definitivamente tengo que darle una oportunidad a sus novelas.
Me he encontrado con un texto demasiado personal. Historias atrevidas, a veces electrizantes y sorprendentes, pero otras muchas demasiado crípticas, incomprensibles. Mezcla de creencias e imaginación desbordante, repleto de imágenes y alegorías y narrado con un léxico culto.
En cualquier caso lo he leído sin desagrado (como creo que lo harán los lectores que busquen algo más que pasar el rato) porque la prosa es elaborada y original, pero realmente no he llegado a entender las intenciones del autor y creo que el formato cuento, salvo ciertos toques de sorpresa, no está demasiado logrado, sobre todo los finales. Yo, al menos, hubiera necesitado un poco más de comprensión para disfrutarlos realmente.
Definitivamente tengo que darle una oportunidad a sus novelas.
January 12, 2020
Compré este libro engañado. El propio libro -y la crítica que leí- decían que se trataba de una colección de cuentos de ciencia ficción. No lo es. De hecho no hay ni una pizca de ciencia o de tecnología 'relevante' o 'especulativa', ni siquiera juega con un sistema social imaginado, una economía modificada o un gobierno diferente, ni lleva a ninguna de esas cosas a sus conclusiones finales. Este libro no es realmente 'exploratorio' en el sentido habitual de la ciencia ficción.
En realidad estos cuentos encajan mejor en la otra referencia que se da en la contraportada: los cuentos filosóficos de Borges o Kafka. Leyéndolos uno recuerda a estos autores y a Cortázar (uno de cuyos cuentos aparece nombrado por su título, reconstruyéndolo en estos nuevos tiempos).
Son cuentos brevísimos (lo que es perfecto para estos tiempos), que se devoran con facilidad y se saborean con un enorme disfrute. Todos diferentes entre sí, aunque con un mismo tono reconocible de cierta derrota existencial. Es cierto que el autor usa imaginería de ciencia ficción tales como mundos extraños, extraterrestres, naves espaciales, etc... pero no parece que lo haga por buscar la identificación de esta obra en el género, sino simplemente porque todas esas cosas ahora ya son lugares comunes, reconocibles, tan cercanos a nosotros como lo eran las ruinas o las tribus perdidas para los tiempos de Borges. Uno a uno y como conjunto funcionan a forma de koans zen para enfrentar al lector a sus propias limitaciones mentales y de los que sales algo trastocado, y con suerte, algo transformado.
No se pierdan esta colección de cuentos, es de lo mejor que he leído en años aunque no sea ciencia ficción.
En realidad estos cuentos encajan mejor en la otra referencia que se da en la contraportada: los cuentos filosóficos de Borges o Kafka. Leyéndolos uno recuerda a estos autores y a Cortázar (uno de cuyos cuentos aparece nombrado por su título, reconstruyéndolo en estos nuevos tiempos).
Son cuentos brevísimos (lo que es perfecto para estos tiempos), que se devoran con facilidad y se saborean con un enorme disfrute. Todos diferentes entre sí, aunque con un mismo tono reconocible de cierta derrota existencial. Es cierto que el autor usa imaginería de ciencia ficción tales como mundos extraños, extraterrestres, naves espaciales, etc... pero no parece que lo haga por buscar la identificación de esta obra en el género, sino simplemente porque todas esas cosas ahora ya son lugares comunes, reconocibles, tan cercanos a nosotros como lo eran las ruinas o las tribus perdidas para los tiempos de Borges. Uno a uno y como conjunto funcionan a forma de koans zen para enfrentar al lector a sus propias limitaciones mentales y de los que sales algo trastocado, y con suerte, algo transformado.
No se pierdan esta colección de cuentos, es de lo mejor que he leído en años aunque no sea ciencia ficción.
August 15, 2020
Diez planetas está fabricado con el material de los grandes clásicos de la literatura, y llega a nosotros en tiempos de descreimiento y pesimismo, cuando pensábamos que todo lo importante ya estaba escrito, para demostrar que aún quedan muchísimas cosas por decir y otras tantas maneras de hacerlo.
Reseña completa: https://libros-prohibidos.com/yuri-he...
Reseña completa: https://libros-prohibidos.com/yuri-he...
June 4, 2023
This is what I like, a unique literary voice harnessed to unusual narratives. This book of stories isn't really a book of conventional stories at all. They are more like vignettes with an average length of about 3 pages.
Although described as Science Fiction this no ordinary genre fare. The stories often take the viewpoint of an alien observing or interacting with humans.
Many of the (human) protagonists are isolated and lost.
I can't say I fully understood them all but I really enjoyed the reading experience
Although described as Science Fiction this no ordinary genre fare. The stories often take the viewpoint of an alien observing or interacting with humans.
Many of the (human) protagonists are isolated and lost.
I can't say I fully understood them all but I really enjoyed the reading experience
December 27, 2020
Tiene un encanto, no sé cuál, pero lo tiene. Es un libro que deja ver esbozos de mundos. Siempre me ha parecido extraño tener que decir que tal texto me recuerda a otro —aunque eso tenga que ver con el horizonte de expectativas de cada persona—; en fin, me recordó mucho a Borges, a Lem (el de Vacío perfecto) y cuentos como "Planetas invisibles" de Hao Jingfang y "Acerca de las costumbres de elaboración de libros en determinadas especies" de Ken Liu. Pero es un libro fallido que no debería brillar por las interpretaciones que hacemos a partir de las intertextualidades que lo habitan.
February 2, 2021
Alucinantes fábulas fantásticas.
Algunas bizarras, algunas crípticas, algunas juguetonas o paródicas, otras coquetean con la ciencia ficción.
Pero realmente no hay ciencia ficción aquí.
Más bien un jugueteo en forma de fábulas softweird.
Hay algunas que sobresalen, cómo El cosmonauta, que tiene el espíritu abreviado de obras como 2001 y Solaris. Otra muy buena es Los últimos, sobre el último viaje de los descendientes de la humanidad.
Aunque la verdad esperaba mucho más... y al final se quedó en 3 estrellas.
Algunas bizarras, algunas crípticas, algunas juguetonas o paródicas, otras coquetean con la ciencia ficción.
Pero realmente no hay ciencia ficción aquí.
Más bien un jugueteo en forma de fábulas softweird.
Hay algunas que sobresalen, cómo El cosmonauta, que tiene el espíritu abreviado de obras como 2001 y Solaris. Otra muy buena es Los últimos, sobre el último viaje de los descendientes de la humanidad.
Aunque la verdad esperaba mucho más... y al final se quedó en 3 estrellas.
February 26, 2023
Obsessed.
June 24, 2022
Una pequeña explosión tras otra de imaginación, humor, ironía y lenguaje tan juguetón como preciso. Ya respetaba a Herrera como narrador luego de leer "Trabajos del reino" y "La transmigración de los cuerpos", pero es sólo ahora, después de haberlo conocido como cuentista, que puedo declararme fan.
Nota bene: Cómo le gusta a este hombre la palabra "ápice".
Nota bene: Cómo le gusta a este hombre la palabra "ápice".
January 2, 2020
Al terminar este libro sentí un poco de rabia, porque es tanta la creatividad y originalidad que el autor pone en sus páginas que termina lastrando el resultado por su falta de dinamismo.
En general se me hizo aburrido y en ocasiones repetitivo.
Eso sí, "El cosmonauta" es uno de los mejores relatos que he leído en mi vida. Lástima que los demás no acompañen.
En general se me hizo aburrido y en ocasiones repetitivo.
Eso sí, "El cosmonauta" es uno de los mejores relatos que he leído en mi vida. Lástima que los demás no acompañen.
September 17, 2023
These ultra short stories are wildly imaginative, yet written in a buttoned-down, measured voice, that can produce all sorts of effects, from horrific to melancholic to comic. Here's a comic example in a single sentence from the short story "Zorg, Author of the Quixote": "Zorg began to weep through a hidden tear duct that was activated only in moments of chaste emotion." It kills me that Zorg's 'people' have a biology that is so finely tuned to the complex nuances of their emotions ;) I am a fan of micro short stories, I love the way they give you a brief shot of intense flavor, then it's on to something completely different. Much props to the translator, Lisa Dillman.
August 22, 2023
This is a fantastic collection of flash fiction that is translated from Spanish. The stories are both speculative and literary. Sometimes I felt like meaning was going over my head, but on the whole, I really enjoyed my time with these stories.
September 21, 2025
mmm i love alienation sm 🤑🤑🤑
August 20, 2020
De la mejor ciencia ficción que he leído en español. Espero que Yuri Herrera se las juegue con una novela del género pronto. Maneja a la perfección los cánones y los lugares comunes de la ciencia ficción, para luego torcerlos con dosis saludables de sin-razón, de referencias a Borges y a Cortázar, de ingenio lingüístico y neologismo. Recomendable lectura. "Los conspiradores" me recordó a China Miéville, mientras que otros de los cuentos tenían algo de los relatos de Ted Chiang.
Pendiente: hacer un repaso de los highlights cuento por cuento, cuando tenga un poquito de tiempo para revisitarlos.
Pendiente: hacer un repaso de los highlights cuento por cuento, cuando tenga un poquito de tiempo para revisitarlos.
February 5, 2023
their principle dogma is that if earth is flat, and if the garden of delights that is the world is a reflection of the same formula on which the rest of the universe is modeled, then earth must exist for the benefit of something else. like sustenance. earth as a host wafer, a tortilla, a cracker traveling through the universe, just awaiting an encounter with the mouth of the creator. and we are what imparts the flavor. earth, to them, is concrete proof of divine cosmic pleasure.with three of yuri herrera's novels and a non-fiction work already available in english translation, a collection of short stories is a most welcome addition. ten planets (diez planetas) features twenty stories from the talented mexican author, ranging in length from two to eleven pages. quite the departure from his earlier books, ten planets finds herrera orbiting a richly imagined milieu earthbound and beyond. science fictiony and other worldly (and indeed inhabiting realms familiar to both borges and calvino), the stories within ten planets further display the broad range of herrera's talent and inventiveness. while many of the pieces could have benefited from a longer treatment, each offers something to marvel over — with perhaps "the cosmonaut" shining brightest of the bunch.
*translated from the spanish by lisa dillman (barba, quintana, halfon, del árbol, et al.)
*3.5 stars
July 4, 2020
Leí por ahí que este libro tiene algo de Crónicas Marcianas, de su espíritu, de Bradbury.
Porque amo Crónicas Marcianas, disiento.
No tiene sus personajes: aquí, la mayoría son esbozos intercambiables. No sabemos gran cosa de quiénes son o de por qué hacen lo que hacen. De sus emociones.
No tiene su poética: ahí donde Bradbury sabía mesurarse en favor de la historia que contaba, Herrera riza el rizo.
Herrera insiste, e insiste, e insiste, e insiste en utilizar esa prosa suya, suya como este párrafo. Es el párrafo que lo cambia todo. Es el párrafo que da vueltas. Todo gira, como güesos que se truenan cuando giran. Vueltas sobre... ¿me entienden?
En cuentos tan breves, algunos de no más de un par de páginas, una prosa así estorba a la historia. Un ejemplo de este lucimiento es que, quién sabe por qué, en uno de los cuentos Herrera pasa líneas y líneas describiendo el mecanismo con el que se abre una puerta hacia unos monstruos, pero no describe a los monstruos en cuestión. ¿Por qué? Lo peor del caso es que el mecanismo no tiene relevancia en la historia, no es interesante intelectualmente y tampoco representa nada para el personaje. Diría que ni siquiera es del todo tangible la descripción.
No tiene, tampoco, la solvencia emocional de Bradbury: como aquí no hay personajes que vivan, que realmente vivan en los mundos, como sus mundos resultan tan incomprensibles y extraños, ¿por qué habría de importar lo que les pase?
Dicho esto, de todos los cuentos, rescato dos. "El terrícola", porque en él la narración avanza sin verse atorada por la prosa de los otros cuentos, y porque el final es sorpresivo de un modo extrañamente reconfortante (aunque no haya mucha razón para tal final). El otro, "El Cosmonauta", el cuento más "cuento" de todos los del volumen, el que contiene al único personaje identificable del conjunto, el de la anécdota que posee tensión, el que tiene emociones. En sí, el personaje cosmonauta es el único que yo creí humano de todo el conjunto.
Ahí donde Bradbury hacía que uno llorara por los marcianos, aquí Herrera hace que los humanos no alcancen a dejar hondura.
El resto del libro son ocurrencias.
Porque amo Crónicas Marcianas, disiento.
No tiene sus personajes: aquí, la mayoría son esbozos intercambiables. No sabemos gran cosa de quiénes son o de por qué hacen lo que hacen. De sus emociones.
No tiene su poética: ahí donde Bradbury sabía mesurarse en favor de la historia que contaba, Herrera riza el rizo.
Herrera insiste, e insiste, e insiste, e insiste en utilizar esa prosa suya, suya como este párrafo. Es el párrafo que lo cambia todo. Es el párrafo que da vueltas. Todo gira, como güesos que se truenan cuando giran. Vueltas sobre... ¿me entienden?
En cuentos tan breves, algunos de no más de un par de páginas, una prosa así estorba a la historia. Un ejemplo de este lucimiento es que, quién sabe por qué, en uno de los cuentos Herrera pasa líneas y líneas describiendo el mecanismo con el que se abre una puerta hacia unos monstruos, pero no describe a los monstruos en cuestión. ¿Por qué? Lo peor del caso es que el mecanismo no tiene relevancia en la historia, no es interesante intelectualmente y tampoco representa nada para el personaje. Diría que ni siquiera es del todo tangible la descripción.
No tiene, tampoco, la solvencia emocional de Bradbury: como aquí no hay personajes que vivan, que realmente vivan en los mundos, como sus mundos resultan tan incomprensibles y extraños, ¿por qué habría de importar lo que les pase?
Dicho esto, de todos los cuentos, rescato dos. "El terrícola", porque en él la narración avanza sin verse atorada por la prosa de los otros cuentos, y porque el final es sorpresivo de un modo extrañamente reconfortante (aunque no haya mucha razón para tal final). El otro, "El Cosmonauta", el cuento más "cuento" de todos los del volumen, el que contiene al único personaje identificable del conjunto, el de la anécdota que posee tensión, el que tiene emociones. En sí, el personaje cosmonauta es el único que yo creí humano de todo el conjunto.
Ahí donde Bradbury hacía que uno llorara por los marcianos, aquí Herrera hace que los humanos no alcancen a dejar hondura.
El resto del libro son ocurrencias.
August 29, 2023
I picked this up because it was a Le Guin Award finalist, because I like short fiction, and because I have more energy for weird or experimental fiction in short form than in long form. I don’t think I realized that the collection would be 80% flash, or I wouldn’t have tried it. I rarely click with flash. That’s on me.
At any rate, there is certainly plenty of weirdness here. Almost everything is written in such a way to distance the reader from the story, with characters rarely given names and ordinary terms for objects often obscured. There are even two stories with the exact same name, despite no obvious connection between them. It can make it tough to find something to latch onto. Some stories are just plain weird, though usually short.
Some have themes that are easier to get a grip on, although those are often *also* weird. The Obituarist is perhaps the most interesting in the collection, focused on how people are remembered. There’s another that involves a chatacter able to determine someone’s personal history by looking at their nose, with a dash of wonder and protection of that wonder. One of the two “The Objects” features a woman losing her family in a dystopian world, and another features a company where the low-level workers are literally turned into rats. These are some of the more memorable pieces in the collection.
Others seem to be there mostly for an amusing or clever twist at the end. I found this most engaging in Flat Map (which is itself referenced in two other stories), though others may enjoy a similar twist in The Earthling.
And Zorg, Author of the Quixote is memorable just for the Borges reference, though the cultural criticism from an alien perspective is certainly fun and entertaining.
But altogether, the entertaining bits were too few and far between, and most of the stories didn’t stick. There’s some good work here, but it’s often too hard to get ahold of.
First impression: 12/20.
At any rate, there is certainly plenty of weirdness here. Almost everything is written in such a way to distance the reader from the story, with characters rarely given names and ordinary terms for objects often obscured. There are even two stories with the exact same name, despite no obvious connection between them. It can make it tough to find something to latch onto. Some stories are just plain weird, though usually short.
Some have themes that are easier to get a grip on, although those are often *also* weird. The Obituarist is perhaps the most interesting in the collection, focused on how people are remembered. There’s another that involves a chatacter able to determine someone’s personal history by looking at their nose, with a dash of wonder and protection of that wonder. One of the two “The Objects” features a woman losing her family in a dystopian world, and another features a company where the low-level workers are literally turned into rats. These are some of the more memorable pieces in the collection.
Others seem to be there mostly for an amusing or clever twist at the end. I found this most engaging in Flat Map (which is itself referenced in two other stories), though others may enjoy a similar twist in The Earthling.
And Zorg, Author of the Quixote is memorable just for the Borges reference, though the cultural criticism from an alien perspective is certainly fun and entertaining.
But altogether, the entertaining bits were too few and far between, and most of the stories didn’t stick. There’s some good work here, but it’s often too hard to get ahold of.
First impression: 12/20.
December 28, 2021
Todavía no acabo de encajar este libro. Es decir, en términos de lenguaje, no está aquí el Herrera que en "La transmigración de los cuerpos" o en "Los trabajos del reino" presentaba un ritmo de viento y arena. Pero, en términos de riesgo, en términos de imaginación, en términos de búsqueda a través de la palabra de escenarios posibles más allá de lo previo: bueno, pues ahí sí está, y no sólo sí está sino que reclama un lugar especulador espectacular, como quien dice que puedo tomar la tradición y la bandera de Rulfo, pero no me encasillen ahí, que también le bailo a Borges si me lo suenan, y ya entrados en gastos le hago también a Monterroso, por qué no. Ese es el Herrera de "Diez planetas", siento, y eso está muy bien, y eso está genial, y eso está prometedor. A ver qué sigue, a ver qué viene, yo, por lo menos, estaré bien atento a las señales.
Read
June 9, 2023Some really interesting/fun premises here, great ideas for science fiction that all feel undercooked because of the extremely short nature of the stories--two or three pages, easily digested and enjoyed, and immediately forgotten. Love this writer but these stories were too short for me. No rating.
December 8, 2019
Breves cuentos de ciencia ficción. Como siempre, la prosa de Yuri es inusual, sorprendente y expresiva.
El cuento "El cosmonauta" es perfecto.
El cuento "El cosmonauta" es perfecto.
March 18, 2023
Very clever SF vignettes, but honestly a big up its own ass.
Read
March 21, 2023Maybe 2-ish stars
Unfortunately this one isn't for me. Some stories are too short (like 2 pages) to really connect to the intrigue and by then it it's already over and onto the next one.
Unfortunately this one isn't for me. Some stories are too short (like 2 pages) to really connect to the intrigue and by then it it's already over and onto the next one.
April 17, 2021
Me es complicado hacer una valoración de este libro, pues es bastante "rarito". Son 20 cuentos, muy breves, de una ciencia ficción fantasiosa y bastante personal. ¿Significa eso que el libro es malo o que no se entienda? No, todo lo contrario, el libro me ha gustado mucho. Es sorprendente, en el mejor sentido: no sabes qué te vas a encontrar en cada una de las historias, y sus desenlaces también te llevan por derroteros inesperados.
Comparto un pequeño fragmento del cuento La otra teoría, como muestra de las historias (y el estilo) que podemos encontrar:
Hay una secta que se formó tras comprobarse que, en efecto, la Tierra es plana. No se sabe el nombre que se dan a sí mismos, sólo que de algún modo incluye alusiones a los cristales del azúcar y de la sal. Su asunto no es ya qué hay del Otro Lado, eso ha sido aceptado como Misterio (...)
Su principal dogma es que si la Tierra es plana, y si el jardín de delicias que es el Mundo es un reflejo de la misma fórmula con la que está modelado el resto del Universo, la Tierra debe de existir para beneficio de algo más. Como una vianda. La Tierra es una oblea, una tortilla, una galleta viajando por el universo en espera del encuentro con la boca del Creador. Y nosotros somos lo que le da sabor (...)
Solemos reírnos mucho de los integrante de la secta. Todo el mundo sabe que el Creador no es una boca, sino el ojo de un dragón, y que el mundo no es sino un parpadeo, un parpadeo, un parpadeo, a punto de pasar, ahora.
¿Cómo calificamos este tipo de historias, en caso de que tengamos que hacerlo? (que no; salvo que nos dediquemos a la crítica literaria, la filología u otra profesión que tenga que ver con las narrativas, como lectores lo único que tenemos que hacer es disfrutar de lo que leemos). En algunos momentos me recordó a las Cosmicómicas de Italo Calvino, pero más oscuro, más críptico, menos amable; más cercano a Stanislaw Lem, teniendo estilos muy diferentes los tres.
Un libro muy recomendable, de un autor al que hay que mantener en el punto de mira (Trabajos del reino en su momento, también me gustó mucho)
Comparto un pequeño fragmento del cuento La otra teoría, como muestra de las historias (y el estilo) que podemos encontrar:
Hay una secta que se formó tras comprobarse que, en efecto, la Tierra es plana. No se sabe el nombre que se dan a sí mismos, sólo que de algún modo incluye alusiones a los cristales del azúcar y de la sal. Su asunto no es ya qué hay del Otro Lado, eso ha sido aceptado como Misterio (...)
Su principal dogma es que si la Tierra es plana, y si el jardín de delicias que es el Mundo es un reflejo de la misma fórmula con la que está modelado el resto del Universo, la Tierra debe de existir para beneficio de algo más. Como una vianda. La Tierra es una oblea, una tortilla, una galleta viajando por el universo en espera del encuentro con la boca del Creador. Y nosotros somos lo que le da sabor (...)
Solemos reírnos mucho de los integrante de la secta. Todo el mundo sabe que el Creador no es una boca, sino el ojo de un dragón, y que el mundo no es sino un parpadeo, un parpadeo, un parpadeo, a punto de pasar, ahora.
¿Cómo calificamos este tipo de historias, en caso de que tengamos que hacerlo? (que no; salvo que nos dediquemos a la crítica literaria, la filología u otra profesión que tenga que ver con las narrativas, como lectores lo único que tenemos que hacer es disfrutar de lo que leemos). En algunos momentos me recordó a las Cosmicómicas de Italo Calvino, pero más oscuro, más críptico, menos amable; más cercano a Stanislaw Lem, teniendo estilos muy diferentes los tres.
Un libro muy recomendable, de un autor al que hay que mantener en el punto de mira (Trabajos del reino en su momento, también me gustó mucho)
June 7, 2020
Como toda colección de cuentos es irregular y se hace repetitivo. Esta colección demuestra nuevamente la habilidad como escritor de Yuri Herrera y su desbordada imaginación.
"El cosmonauta" es excelente. Honestamente, luego de leer "El cosmonauta" el resto del libro perdió brillo, solo por "El cosmonauta" hay que leer "Diez Planetas"
"El cosmonauta" es excelente. Honestamente, luego de leer "El cosmonauta" el resto del libro perdió brillo, solo por "El cosmonauta" hay que leer "Diez Planetas"
September 5, 2023
NOMINATED FOR THE 2023 URSULA K. LE GUIN PRIZE FOR FICTION
A collection of mostly flash fiction exploring various speculative ideas. Reminiscent of Stanislaw Lem both in prose, style and themes (alienation, high-concept short stories, language). I liked this most for its often unusual stories. Probably my favorite work by Yuri Herrera!
A collection of mostly flash fiction exploring various speculative ideas. Reminiscent of Stanislaw Lem both in prose, style and themes (alienation, high-concept short stories, language). I liked this most for its often unusual stories. Probably my favorite work by Yuri Herrera!
January 30, 2024
the stories really fell off in the second half. 2.5
January 25, 2024
This was a fun book of very short stories from Mexican expat author Yuri Herrera, and my first book by him. They are a mash of literary speculative fiction, some stories I'd almost fit into the "new weird" subgenre since, even though they play with sci-fi tropes, they definitely don't operate like typical sci-fi stories. Many of them are very playful thought experiments, like the one-page story about the gut bacteria that develops sentience but doesn't live long enough to make anything of it, or the two back-to-back stories titled "The Objects."
I had some trepidation when I picked this up because the cover blurb compares this to Borges and Calvino, and I really struggled to enjoy Calvino's Invisible Cities a few months ago, but found these stories more entertaining, if not more meaningful. A few even reminded me of Ted Chiang.
I had some trepidation when I picked this up because the cover blurb compares this to Borges and Calvino, and I really struggled to enjoy Calvino's Invisible Cities a few months ago, but found these stories more entertaining, if not more meaningful. A few even reminded me of Ted Chiang.
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