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Uncategorized: The ABD and Other Tales
Contents:
The Timestoppers (an audio story)
Jump
The Club
Peroxide Head
The Meateaters
The ABD
How to Dispose of Sneakers
Suicides
Pictures
Letters to the Chintzes
The Failure
BeaviorNorm
The Case for RFID
Buyer's Club
Zara Gets Laid
The Timestoppers (an audio story)
Jump
The Club
Peroxide Head
The Meateaters
The ABD
How to Dispose of Sneakers
Suicides
Pictures
Letters to the Chintzes
The Failure
BeaviorNorm
The Case for RFID
Buyer's Club
Zara Gets Laid
280 pages, ebook
First published September 22, 2009
2 people want to read
About the author
Sue Lange
17 books19 followersThe Perpetual Motion Club is coming out in August. To mark the occasion, the publisher is hosting a giveaway over at the book's page. Register to win a copy.
Here's the real bio:
I'm the author of Tritcheon Hash, We, Robots, Uncategorized, and The Textile Planet. My writing is satiric in nature, science fiction in genre.
I often have giveaways and discounts on my books. To sign up for deals and freebies, go here: http://eepurl.com/nh1r9
My latest book, The Perpetual Motion Club will be out in August, 2013. To receive news about that, go here: http://eepurl.com/nh1r9
Excerpt from THE PERPETUAL MOTION CLUB
"Northawken High, Northawken, PA. Fourth Period: Geometry. Mr. Brown, the teaching associate, has just stepped out for an illegal smoke. As a result, all hell is breaking loose."
Here's the real bio:
I'm the author of Tritcheon Hash, We, Robots, Uncategorized, and The Textile Planet. My writing is satiric in nature, science fiction in genre.
I often have giveaways and discounts on my books. To sign up for deals and freebies, go here: http://eepurl.com/nh1r9
My latest book, The Perpetual Motion Club will be out in August, 2013. To receive news about that, go here: http://eepurl.com/nh1r9
Excerpt from THE PERPETUAL MOTION CLUB
"Northawken High, Northawken, PA. Fourth Period: Geometry. Mr. Brown, the teaching associate, has just stepped out for an illegal smoke. As a result, all hell is breaking loose."
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
January 14, 2020
Uncategorized: The ABD And Other Tales, an e-book published by Book View Cafe (http://www.bookviewcafe.com), collects fifteen stories by Sue Lange previously published in various online and print magazines. Uncategorized is a good description of the collection, which contains a variety of fantasy and science fiction stories without an overarching thematic thread. This is not meant as a criticism, since many single author collections do not have a theme other than “stories written by the author” unless the writer is known for focusing on a narrow range of themes.
A number of the stories in the book are somewhat depressing and cynical, including “Jumper”, which is about suicide, and “How to Dispose of Sneakers”, in which an environmental enforcement agent trying to trace a Styrofoam spill falls victim to the meat industry, or “Buyer's Club”, about an evil HMO. “The Club” is a nicely twisted little story of a secret cabal of scientists and others who may really secretly be making the world a better place, but largely through duplicity, really good marketing (same thing as duplicity really), genetic manipulation, and mind control, with a humorous twist at the end when the reason for the protagonist breaking ranks and testifying before Congress is revealed.
Of course, a number upbeat stories are included as well. “BehaviorNorm” is a fun tale of union activity and the perils of aptitude testing. And “Suicides” is an upbeat story of the triumph of individualism and self-understanding over advertising. My favorite was “Pictures”, one of the few fantasy stories in the collection, which is a lovely little ghost story set in an old hotel in a small town.
Taking advantage of the fact that this is an e-book, the first story in the collection, “The Timestoppers”, is in audio format and is a performance complete with soundtrack rather than a straight reading. Also, the table of contents is formatted as live links, so the reader can jump directly to a particular story without paging through.
Lange provides an introduction for each of the stories. It is always interesting to find out what inspired an author to write a particular story or how an author's opinion of a story may have changed with the passage of time. Fans of Lange's work will enjoy having so many of her stories collected in one place, and readers looking for something new will appreciate the variety of the collection.
A number of the stories in the book are somewhat depressing and cynical, including “Jumper”, which is about suicide, and “How to Dispose of Sneakers”, in which an environmental enforcement agent trying to trace a Styrofoam spill falls victim to the meat industry, or “Buyer's Club”, about an evil HMO. “The Club” is a nicely twisted little story of a secret cabal of scientists and others who may really secretly be making the world a better place, but largely through duplicity, really good marketing (same thing as duplicity really), genetic manipulation, and mind control, with a humorous twist at the end when the reason for the protagonist breaking ranks and testifying before Congress is revealed.
Of course, a number upbeat stories are included as well. “BehaviorNorm” is a fun tale of union activity and the perils of aptitude testing. And “Suicides” is an upbeat story of the triumph of individualism and self-understanding over advertising. My favorite was “Pictures”, one of the few fantasy stories in the collection, which is a lovely little ghost story set in an old hotel in a small town.
Taking advantage of the fact that this is an e-book, the first story in the collection, “The Timestoppers”, is in audio format and is a performance complete with soundtrack rather than a straight reading. Also, the table of contents is formatted as live links, so the reader can jump directly to a particular story without paging through.
Lange provides an introduction for each of the stories. It is always interesting to find out what inspired an author to write a particular story or how an author's opinion of a story may have changed with the passage of time. Fans of Lange's work will enjoy having so many of her stories collected in one place, and readers looking for something new will appreciate the variety of the collection.
February 10, 2010
Honestly, in general I'm not too big a fan of short stories. Possibly because I subconsciously hold them to the same standards as novels, which is blatantly unfair as there's not nearly the same time to create an atmosphere, sympathy for the characters and an interest in the plot.
Sometimes you have to go out on a limb though, and as I am a big fan of sci-fi and thought the premise of Uncategorized... sounded interesting I eagerly agreed when offered the chance to review it. And Sue Lange didn't disappoint. The stories were well-written and interesting, sometimes taking the altertive universe to the extreme (or absurd), which is just how I like it!
The first story, "The Timestoppers", threw me for a loop, as it turned out it was a link to an audio story, and I therefore couldn't "read" it on my e-reader. I agree with Sue Lange that the story worked better as an audio than it would have on the written page, but disagree that e-books should include multi-media whenever possible. While my e-reader does support audio-files, it doesn't have internet access, so I had to return to my computer in order to listen to it, which meant that I saved it for last. Not a problem if you're prepared for it, or if your e-reader supports this format, but a bit of a hassle if it doesn't.
A minor detail though and as the rest of the book can easily be read without this first short story that's probably what I'll be doing on subsequent read-throughs. Because I definitely will be rereading it. I was fascinated by "Letters to the Chintzes", describing the treatment of their daughter who'd been bitten by a rabid animal, and would have wanted "The Failure" to be a lot longer than it was - musical tales have always been interesting to me. I was intrigued by the link between "The Club" and "How to Dispose of Sneakers", loved the final twist of "Peroxide Head" and was appalled by the deception portrayed in "Buyer's Club". However, my favourite was definitely "BehaviorNorm" with its interesting consequence of a person believing machines always to be right, and suddenly being proven wrong.
A fun read, that I'd happily recommend to others.
Sometimes you have to go out on a limb though, and as I am a big fan of sci-fi and thought the premise of Uncategorized... sounded interesting I eagerly agreed when offered the chance to review it. And Sue Lange didn't disappoint. The stories were well-written and interesting, sometimes taking the altertive universe to the extreme (or absurd), which is just how I like it!
The first story, "The Timestoppers", threw me for a loop, as it turned out it was a link to an audio story, and I therefore couldn't "read" it on my e-reader. I agree with Sue Lange that the story worked better as an audio than it would have on the written page, but disagree that e-books should include multi-media whenever possible. While my e-reader does support audio-files, it doesn't have internet access, so I had to return to my computer in order to listen to it, which meant that I saved it for last. Not a problem if you're prepared for it, or if your e-reader supports this format, but a bit of a hassle if it doesn't.
A minor detail though and as the rest of the book can easily be read without this first short story that's probably what I'll be doing on subsequent read-throughs. Because I definitely will be rereading it. I was fascinated by "Letters to the Chintzes", describing the treatment of their daughter who'd been bitten by a rabid animal, and would have wanted "The Failure" to be a lot longer than it was - musical tales have always been interesting to me. I was intrigued by the link between "The Club" and "How to Dispose of Sneakers", loved the final twist of "Peroxide Head" and was appalled by the deception portrayed in "Buyer's Club". However, my favourite was definitely "BehaviorNorm" with its interesting consequence of a person believing machines always to be right, and suddenly being proven wrong.
A fun read, that I'd happily recommend to others.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews