Cruel Miracles

Maps in a Mirror #4

by Orson Scott Card

A collection of science fiction tales includes "An Eye for an Eye," as well as an autobiography by the author

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

242 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1990

About the author

Orson Scott Card is an American writer known best for his science fiction works. He is (as of 2023) the only person to have won a Hugo Award and a Nebula Award in consecutive years, winning both awards for his novel Ender's Game (1985) and its sequel Speaker for the Dead (1986). A feature film adaptation of Ender's Game, which Card co-produced, was released in 2013. Card also wrote the Locus Fantasy Award-winning series The Tales of Alvin Maker (1987–2003).
Card's fiction often features characters with exceptional gifts who make difficult choices with high stakes. Card has also written political, religious, and social commentary in his columns and other writing; his opposition to homosexuality has provoked public criticism.
Card, who is a great-great-grandson of Brigham Young, was born in Richland, Washington, and grew up in Utah and California. While he was a student at Brigham Young University (BYU), his plays were performed on stage. He served in Brazil as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) and headed a community theater for two summers. Card had 27 short stories published between 1978 and 1979, and he won the John W. Campbell Award for best new writer in 1978. He earned a master's degree in English from the University of Utah in 1981 and wrote novels in science fiction, fantasy, non-fiction, and historical fiction genres starting in 1979. Card continued to write prolifically, and he has published over 50 novels and 45 short stories.
Card teaches English at Southern Virginia University; he has written two books on creative writing and serves as a judge in the Writers of the Future contest. He has taught many successful writers at his "literary boot camps". He remains a practicing member of the LDS Church and Mormon fiction writers Stephenie Meyer, Brandon Sanderson, and Dave Wolverton have cited his works as a major influence.

Reviews

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent collection of longish short stories that explore religion, although not in the way I expected. Card's foreword & afterword were both great. He defines his beliefs on religion in SF in the former. I didn't fully agree with them, but I did by the time he was done. In no way does he push his brand of religion on anyone, but he takes a look at the overriding purposes of ritual & faith.

He's a smart guy with interesting insights. His condemnation in the court of political correctness is one of its more idiotic verdicts. The man is not his art - his art is a distillation of his insights, some of which he finds repugnant & yet makes a case for anyway. For instance, in one story a man fights to honor another by completing a religious ritual which requires him to carry the man's shit (literally) on a harrowing journey. He finds it ludicrous, very strange & repugnant, but ... Anyway, the story makes its point very, very well.

In this edition, he & several others read the stories. While he didn't mention it this time, he's said before that he writes his stories to be read out loud. They were fantastic in this format.

The only issue I had with these stories is their length. If they'd all been a bit shorter, I would have given this 5 stars - possibly should anyway. Highly recommended!

[Craig · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cruel Miracles is the fourth collection of short fiction by Card that formed a fifth of the massive Maps in a Mirror hardcover volume... which I wish I had bitten the bullet and purchased instead of all of the mass market paperbacks, but it's too late now. This one contains six stories from 1978 - '87, most of them from genre magazines including F & SF, Asimov's, Omni, Analog, and Night Cry along with one from the New Dimensions anthology series. The stories are all on the theme of religion and spirituality of one form or another, and include fantasy and horror as well as sf. Card, of course, is well known as a Mormon, but doesn't proselytize in the stories or his interesting notes about them. I thought that they were all good stories, both thought-provoking and well-written. Eye for Eye is something of a classic (it won the Hugo award for best novella of 1987), and I also particularly liked Saving Grace from Night Cry and St. Amy's Tale from Omni. The Peter Scanlan cover is quite striking, but I didn't like it.

[David Nichols · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some fine stories adorn this collection, but the best part is probably the introductory essay, where Card argues that science fiction is actually a disguised form of religious literature. Thinking of the intensity of the SF fans I know, and some of the larger themes (cosmic wonder, ascension, free will, the end of the world) that science fiction engages, I am inclined to agree.

[Bestem · Rating 3 out of 5]

I seem to like dark and dismal short stories, and I found myself liking these. The first one, titled Mortal Gods, was, I believe, my favorite. It was about these aliens who come to earth and worship human beings, because humans die, and these aliens do not. I think that when I worry most about death, thinking about how it defines us, and makes us do things we otherwise wouldn't, really is something great.

Saving Grace, about a kid who wants so badly to be healed by a faith healer that he manages to paralyze himself and then finds out that the faith healer is nothing more than a con-man... but ends up having the gift of healing himself, was an odd story. I'm not sure I liked it. It wasn't bad, it just didn't make me think the way the first one did.

Eye for Eye I enjoyed. I liked the hero, struggling so badly with the weight of what he'd done on his shoulders. Someone who killed without meaning to for his entire life, and was trying to get it under control. He was very human, which is an odd thing to say about a kid who can kill by getting angry, but he was. He doubted, he grieved, he wanted to be loved...

St. Amy's Tale, a story about a family that destroys all technology, was harder to understand. Part of that might be the way it kept flipping from one time to another time. The underlying story I enjoyed, but I didn't really like the conclusion, I guess. What happened in the future, rather than the past.

Kingsmeat was a definite favorite. I'm not sure I understood the ending of that one either, but I really did like the majority of the story. In it there is a man who butchers people for the aliens to eat, daily, but he keeps the people all alive. The people are being tortured by this man. Then some spacemen come to save them, and everyone finds out that this person was actually doing everything in his power to keep them alive, and that on every other planet these aliens had lived on, all the humans had long since been killed. It's a definite mind twist to think of your torturer as your savior.

Lastly was Holy, I'm not entirely sure I enjoyed that one either. I like the duty and honor of the characters in it. One thing I'm really interested in is how exactly it relates to Card's Worthing stories, as they mentioned that the planet they were on was Worthing. It was very unlike any of the stories in the Worthing Saga.

[Helen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an intriguing book of sci-fi plus spirituality. The stories, and the title, seemed to say that we can't experience good in the world without experiencing pain.

[Hung]

God, why do sci-fi/fantasy books have to have such embarrassingly stupid covers?

Anyway, this is a really good collection of stories. Orson Scott Card is a pretty devout and outspoken Mormon, which may seem unusual for a sci-fi writer. However, Card contends in the Introduction that "speculative fiction--science fiction in particular--is the last American refuge of religious literature." Cruel Miracles makes a good case for this being true.

I enjoyed all of the stories, though probably "Saving Grace" the most. Surprisingly, "Eye for Eye," for which Card won a Hugo Award, was less than what I hoped for.

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

Readability 7. Rating 6. A collection of "religious" short stories by Card. I have to admit that when I found out he was a Mormon, I was somewhat taken aback. But I have come to believe that he is a thinking man's believer. He seems to have pondered broadly, and, surprising to me, taken into his life an organized religion. These stories are evidence of his broad pondering, as well as his conviction that religion has a purpose. The stories are strongly imaginative and well done. I enjoyed Eye for an Eye the most, but each had merit. His discussion of Kingsmeat was particularly interesting. All in all, another solid part of Card's body of work.

[Tom Infanger]

Cruel Miracles indeed. The author's views on religious ideas is very thought provoking. His ideas of what may be of "religious" significance to any one set of beings make these stories intimately powerful and thought provoking. I think the very idea of trying to understand the narrations of each of these stories exemplifies the diverse nature of religious belief in the whole of mankind. We may not agree with the belief but we must be understanding that we don't all believe in the same things or the same gods.

[Luis Cardenas · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cada uno de estos tomos de Scott Card tiene unos cuentos que gustan en demasía y otros que no tanto.
Ojo por ojo es sin duda el mejor cuento, una estructura precisa y vertiginosa de acontecimientos que facilmente podrian ser una novela por si solo, Dioses Mortales y Carne del Rey tambien son de los mejores.
Ya solo me falta un tomo y tendre un tesoro con cinco gemas en la biblioteca.

[Robby S. Hunt · Rating 3 out of 5]

First three stories were easily a 4/5. Very interesting.

Fourth story fell really flat for me 1/5

The fifth and sixth stories were enjoyable, if not a little slow. 3/5

Overall rating 3.5/5
Some neat ideas that explore the theme of "religion" from different angles. I enjoyed this book a lot and finished it in just two sittings across consecutive days.

[Gnomon · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are no throw-away tales in this. I originally read "Eye for Eye" in Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine and grabbed this book just to read that story again. The others, though, are just as good.

[Richard Kelly · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you like sci-fi and short fiction, this is a great collection. Some of my favorite short stories are in this collection. Mortal Gods, Eye for an Eye, and Kingsmeat are all classics in my view. A good representation of stories with and without action.

[Tanya Beaton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some stories that make you think... And I appreciate that he put an explanation of where the ideas came from for each at the end. I do enjoy a good collection of short stories. Looking forward to finding and reading the other three!

[JoAnn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting stories, but I'm disappointed by the repeated invoking of the Lord's name. I wonder why the author believes it is necessary.

Several of the stories made me feel reflective. The language problem improved after "Eye For Eye. "

[Lisi · Rating 1 out of 5]

All of OSC's other books that I've read were so amazing that I thought this one would be too - Sorry to say it was a little disappointing.

[Ken · Rating 4 out of 5]

Eye for an Eye started strong but fizzles off half way on. Lost boys can be quite haunting and stay with u long after reading.

[Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

Religious ones on this one. Interesting.

[Cats 274 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rahlo, včasih pa zelo morbidne pripovedi, v katerih se vprašanja morale, vere, pomembnega in normalnega pogosto postavijo na glavo. ZF na nekoliko drugačen način.

[Kelly Wagner · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some very odd takes on religion, and, as he promises, none of it is about Mormons.

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was enjoyable and interesting. I liked the stories and also the explanations of how each story came to be written.

[Ben · Rating 2 out of 5]

Most of these stories (not all of them short) have a heavy religious theme or plot or aspect woven in, and frankly there not very good stories as a result. This is clear even though Card tries to deny it in the introduction ("when I turned my hand to writing science fiction and fantasy I made a deliberate choice to exclude religions concerns from my writing").

'Saving Grace' is about a boy who gets crippled and gets healing powers flaunted by scamming televangelist preachers. A not very interesting story results. 'Eye for an Eye' is about a boy who is orphaned and gets killing powers (in which he can will cancer or other acute internal damage to people around him) and who finds himself being brought back to a very religious and pure-blood obsessed family. It's long, but not worth it. 'St. Amy's Tale' is about a small group of people on an airplane (that can fly for years?) trying to destroy any and all technology left on the Earth after some sort of apocalypse so that they can...I don't know...return to the good old days? And 'Holy' is a long drag about a corporate stooge trying to understand the quirky religious rites of some primitive culture he's trying to profit from (or something). I had to glance back at the book to remember these plots. They're really forgettable.

With the exception of 'Kingsmeat,' which is more like a Stephen King or George R. R. Martin short story. In short, some strange aliens have taken over an agrarian society straight out of medieval Europe. They need to eat flesh, and one man takes it on himself to gather flesh from the members of the community piece-by-piece instead of one whole person at a time. In this way he saves their lives, but at the cost of their gross disfigurement and deep fear and resentment. When this all comes to light, the community members are unable to recognize what he has done for them. It's a gross story with a very vivid image of the surgical removal of a young woman's breasts that seems...grotesque and creepy. Card in an afterward scoffs at feminist criticism of this scene, but it really is creepy and unnecessary for the story, and this it does seem twisted, pornographic, and there for the shock value. Any other example or scene might have worked as well, but then again, maybe this story wouldn't be so famous if that element had been changed. Either way, this story is worth a read.

[Camilo Guerra · Rating 4 out of 5]

-Sanson era un psicópata.

Antología de cuentos del gran Orson Scott Card.

LO BUENO: No esperaba tanto de esta antología, porque dije: -¿Orson en relatos cortos?, debe ser pura propaganda de tipo religioso, pero no, acá se habla un montón de Dioses, muerte, espiritualidad, pero no te sermonen, no, CARNE DE REY es un relato de terror tremendo, con fantasía y sci-fi que me quedara marcado de por vida, GRACIA SALVADORA es potente y te da esperanza y rabia a partes iguales,OJO POR OJO parece escrito por Stephen King en uno de sus mejores momentos y otros que no son tan buenos, pero es porque estos dos son inmensos.

LO MALO: Los otros cuentos no son malos, pero son comparar a James Rodriguez en versión 2014 a su versión 2023, o Camerón Diaz versión LA MASCARA a la versión que sale en EL AVISPON VERDE.

[Gilles · Rating 3 out of 5]

Un recueil de nouvelles d'Orson Scott Card ayant un lien avec la religion. Il faut tenir compte que Card est mormon et que la religion est importante pour lui.

Voici les nouvelles :

1) Les dieux mortels
Des extraterrestres face à la mort

2) Grâce salvatrice
Le don de guérison !

3) Oeil pour oeil
Tuer sans le vouloir vraiment

4) Le conte de Sainte-Amy
Sacrifier pour sauver ?

5) Mets de roi
Sacrifier une partie ou perdre tout

6) Sacré
Drôle de façon de rendre hommage à un mort

Card trouve le moyen de nous faire réfléchir sur le pouvoir, la mort, le choix et les spécificités des cultures.

J'ai aimé pour la réflexion même s'il n'y avait pas de coup de coeur.

[Taylor · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best parts of this book is the forward by the author. He writes a fascination exploration of why science fiction is the only true form of religious literature left. I also liked each story on this collection but I am a sucker for nuanced stories of religion and belief.

[Ari Pérez · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mortal Gods ****
Saving Grace ***
Eye for Eye ***
St. Amy's Tale ***
Kingsmeat ****
Holy ***

[Ellis Wasend · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well that was devastating… and disturbing, I hope I can write like this some day

[Michael Rosenfeld · Rating 4 out of 5]

More like a 4.5.

[Gerhard Jason · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is comprised of 6 short stories and a lengthy introduction. The introduction was quite intriguing. The first two stories were excellent. If there were no more stories, I would have given the book 5 stars. The next two stories were terribly boring, and I gave up on this book without finishing it.

[John E · Rating 2 out of 5]

Perfectly acceptable stories. Unfortunately I read Card's introduction first and that was a real turn-off. Sorry, Mr. Card, but insiders' views of their own positions are not objective -- it does take an disinterested outsider to examine positions objectively, even religious positions. His religious fantasy does not come close to Spyder Robinson nor Terry Pratchett.

[Chris Gunty · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting to read Card's take on speculative religious fiction.