The stories vary considerably in length (I listened on Audible where they ranged from around six minutes to over three hours) and the style is often an account delivered from a particular and singular perspective. It isn't dystopian, it doesn't preach, and nor does it labour its message of who and what we are but it does make us think. Humanity with its strengths and failings is the driving force for all of these stories how we think and feel and relate to others and what happens when technology becomes a part of the picture.
Sentience comes up again in The Great Silence, this time in a tale spanning Arecibo, the Fermi Paradox, and parrots, while Omphalos gently and carefully challenges one person's profound faith in a deity. The title story, Exhalation, is superb and The Lifecycle of Software Objects is a dissection of difference, AI, and what constitutes sentience in virtual world entities. These are stories with the nature of parables - and so slightly moralistic at times - but that, wherever they're set, have a science/speculative fiction slant. It's almost inevitable that a collection will miss a five star rating because some part of it doesn't appeal and that's the case here. And, each in its own way, the stories prove that complex and thoughtful science fiction can rise to new heights of beauty, meaning and compassion. In Exhalation, Ted Chiang wrestles with the oldest questions on earth - what is the nature of the universe? What does it mean to be human? - and ones that no one else has even imagined. Also included are two brand-new stories: ‘Omphalos’ and ‘Anxiety Is the Dizziness of Freedom’.
And in ‘The Lifecycle of Software Objects’, a woman cares for an artificial intelligence over 20 years, elevating a faddish digital pet into what might be a true living being. In the epistolary ‘Exhalation’, an alien scientist makes a shocking discovery with ramifications not just for his own people but for all of reality. In ‘The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate’, a portal through time forces a fabric seller in ancient Baghdad to grapple with past mistakes and the temptation of second chances.
This much-anticipated second collection of stories is signature Ted Chiang, full of revelatory ideas and deeply sympathetic characters.
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