Beyond the Rift

Anyone who is unfamiliar with Peter Watts as an author and might be unwilling to dive right into the deep end with Starfish or Blindsight (and the subsequent novels that follow up in the respective worlds those two novels introduce) would be doing themselves a disservice by not taking a chance and reading a copy of Beyond the Rift. Hell, even existing fans of Peter Watts are making a mistake by not picking up a copy of this book. Beyond the Rift contains 13 of the most fascinating, diverse, and occasionally challenging science fiction stories that have been written. Those who, like myself, already own a copy of Ten Monkeys, Ten Minutes (his previous collection of short fiction) will be familiar with six of the stories that are collected in Beyond the Rift, but they are the six best stories from the previous collection...especially The Second Coming of Jasmine Fitzgerald and Ambassador, which were my two personal favorites from the previous anthology. I loved those stories enough that I didn't skip over them when reading through this new collection. This particular anthology of his work starts of strong with The Things, a retelling of Director John Carpenter's The Thing (an adaptation of Who Goes There? by John W. Campbell) from the perspective of the titular Thing. I'd read this story previously, when Watts made it available on his website years ago, but it (like his other work) was well worth reading a second time. Following that was The Island, an equally strong story that was partially familiar to me as well because of samples of it that Watts had been posting on his blog as it was being written. Hell, this book would be worth having on the merit of those two stories alone, but it is so much more than that. Along with the two stories I already mentioned that exist in both Beyond the Rift and Ten Monkeys, Ten Minutes are the fantastic stories Home and A Niche (which was my first introduction to Peter Watts when I read it back in the late 90s), both of which are stand alone snippets of the narrative that appears in Starfish...which could serve as an impetus to read that novel and the three that follow it. It certainly had that effect on me. Thirteen stories and not a weak one among them.

I had read a few of these stories before (most online) but several of them are good enough to warrant another read. Also found some new ones that I really liked. Mr. Watts sense of (dark) humor never fails to entertain and he writes lovely prose that keeps me entertained from beginning to end. And as usual his stories are not only entertaining but have interesting themes that get's the brain going as well. This book would probably be worth its price on account fo the short story "The Things" alone!

yet quite original and mostly thought-provoking thirteen (hard) SF short stories written/published between 1990 and 2010 are contained in a single volume here. Don't expect some merry ride with happy ending, though, but be prepared instead for an atmosphere/style as bone-chillingly cold as deep space/ocean! The writing is smart, uncompromising and precise, with occasional grittiness and violence. A not-so-minor gripe of mine, however, is that resorting not infrequently to scientific jargon may hinder full appreciation of Watts' intended message. You can come across technical terms of biochemistry, neuroscience, cosmology, what have you, like: actomyosin, adrenocortical analogs, anoxia, ATOC pulses, benthic ooze, cumulonimbus, dendrite, eumelanin, Hawking Hoop, myoelectric, perspex, phaeophytin, or ventral notochord, etc. with aliquot, photophore, and subroutine being his favourite words - a glossary would have come in handy. It's also questionable how many readers know exactly/are able to recall from their high school/college studies what, say, parietal and occipital lobes are responsible for. Contents: 1. The things (2010) 2. The island (2009) 3. The second coming of Jasmine Fitzgerald (1998) 4. A word for heathens (2004) 5. Home (2000) 6. The eyes of god (2008) 7. Flesh made word (1994) 8. Nimbus (1994) 9. Mayfly (2005) 10. Ambassador (2002) 11. Hillcrest v Velikovsky (2008) 12. Repeating the past (2007) 13. A niche (1990) + Outtro [sic]: 'En route to dystopia with the angry optimist,' in which pseudo-essay the Canadian author is reflecting on some of his themes and current state of affairs, such as the erosion of civil rights on the apropos of a humiliating incident of unjustified and harsh treatment he had to endure at the hands of US Customs thugs and prosecution representing the State of Michigan. I tend to agree with his general assessment/outlook: "[W]hat do you call a world of decent folks ground beneath the boot-heels of despots and sociopaths if not dystopia? You can trot out your folksy tales of good hearts and personal redemption, your small hopeful candles flickering down at the street level; I can't help noticing the darkness pressing down from overhead, the global dysfunction that throws the world on its side despite the angels of our better natures" (pp. 228-9). The above stories explore some of the following themes - A) encounter with alien intelligence: parasitic "communion" as a method for evolvement (1), deceit and back-stabbing are not exclusive to human realm only (2, 10 - I really dig the idea of an interstellar Bermuda triangle), while at the same time Watts expresses a sense of wonder at universe's life-affirming potential, thusly: "The rules are so different here. Most of space is tranquil: no diel or seasonal cycles, no ice ages or global tropics, no wild pendulum swings between hot and cold, calm and tempestuous. Life's precursors abound: on comets, clinging to asteroids, suffusing nebulae a hundred lightyears across. Molecular clouds glow with organic chemistry and life-giving radiation. Their vast dusty wings grow warm with infrared, filter out the hard stuff, give rise to stellar nurseries that only some stunted refugee from the bottom of a gravity well could ever call lethal" (2, p. 43). B) transhumanism: brain-computer interface/emulating human emotions/virtual reality (7, 9), bioengineered new millenium mermaids and the ethical dilemma of recruiting abused victims in hazardous environment (5, 13), on the road to total surveillance/thought police (6), transfering shocking memories (12); C) it seems the author has a chunky beef with Christian religious faith (as per Catholic dogma and institution) that manifests in mockery (11), targets hypocracy of a child-fondling priest who commits suicide to escape shame (6), or analyzes inquisitorial fervour and the shifting foundation of faith - "Sometimes it isn't the experience of redemption that makes the greatest champions, but the longing for it" (4, p. 98); D) artificial intelligence with its own agenda (2); E) sentient storm clouds as Gaia's hands of vengeance (8), so forth. While at the first look it might appear that the writer's stance is that of a reductionist materialist being trained under the current ruling paradigm ("You've been solved...You're mechanical. Chemicals and electricity. Everything you are, every dream, every action, it all comes down to a change of voltage somewhere..." 13, p. 206, and suchlike), sometimes one is under the impression as if Watts were searching for the ghost in the machine/soul (as in chapter 1 - but finds nothing even remotely close), or heavens forbid, even God: "How thinly does I spread itself across the heavens? The flesh is huge, the flesh is inconceivable. But the spirit...is -This is no mere alien. But I'm not quite ready to believe in Gods" (2, p. 33). The closest he comes to the thin line between mind and matter is the story in ch. 3, with quantum theory being tossed in. In closing let me say, and you may disagree, that one deficiency of this collection to consider could be that except for three stories (2, 10, 13), the punchlines for the rest are either weak/unmemorable (3, 4, 8, 9, 11), somewhat predictable (7, 12), or missing entirely/indeterminable (1, 5, 6).

Most of what I read is technical materia, abstract mathematics, or history. Usually the fiction I read is just something to kill some time and let my mind wander away for a while. With Peter Watts, it's different. I read his work in order to bring my mind out of the dark. Whenever I get bored or sad or stuck in a rut, I read one of his books to snap me back into the world of the living. I always come away thinking new thoughts, or thinking about thought, or at least thinking old thoughts in a new light. This collection of stories is no different. They're short but engaging. Surreal, yet illuminating. You should buy this up and enjoy the ride. It's more than worth the price of admission.

It's a short story collection. Some are great (the island is fantastic). Some are weak, some are good. The essay at the end is very interesting. If you like Peter watts it's worth reading this, if you don't have an opinion on him go read blindsight first.

What happens when straight-forward concepts of pulp fiction are handled by a skilful but internally twisted author? You have something akin to the collection under review. Like pulpy scifi, the ideas at the core of these tales are good. But those plots would have been worthy of being pursued if there were characters with warmth, wit and empathy to shoulder them. Instead we had extremely unpleasant characters making a hash of those ideas. Despite the author being lavishly praised by critics, I found his writing to be seriously problematic. He uses rape as a general tool for carrying forward his ideas through the characters. Sometimes the perpetrator is an alien, sometimes a family-member. Overall, I am distinctly unhappy with this book. And I wouldn't touch anything written by this author with even a pole.

Each of these shorts deserves a novel treatment, especially The Island and the rest of the stories in the Sunflower cycle. Maybe we'll get one some day. Every one of these is brilliant (even Flesh Made Word, which PW himself has described as emo and overwrought - well, maybe, but the sinister idea behind it is worthy enough) and leaves the reader craving more, with the possible exception of the Lenie Clarke story, not that it isn't also great, but if you've read Starfish or the Rifters books then it will seem like well-tread ground. The wee essay in the back where PW defends himself against his 'dark' and 'sinister' reputation is also worth the price of the whole book on its own.

Comme à son habitude Peter Watts signe un très bon livre. Ce livre se compose de petites histoires très réussies. Au travers de ces histoires, Peter Watts explore avec talent des questions de fond. Je conseille vivement ce livre à tous les passionnés de science-fiction.

I didn't know what to expect when I bought this series of 1s & 0s. I'd read a piece in a sci-fi magazine about Peter Watts and his story based on John Carpenter's The Thing, but from the Thing's perspective. So I bought the e-book and read the story, it was good and left me wondering about one of my favourite movies. The rest of the stories are good, only one left me wondering what the hell went on.

found it very hard to get into and consequently haven't read it fully.