sonia | Stories! Superheroes and ableism

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Laser Eyes Ain’t Everything by Effie Seiberg. A fun riff on superheroes that takes a serious look at the frustrations of ableism.

Monster by Naomi Kritzer. Darker than what Naomi Kritzer usually writes and what I recommend, but very well done. Nerdy friendship gone wrong.

Better Living Through Algorithms by Naomi Kritzer. A more hopeful look (than what is really happening) at what AI could do for us.

All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt by Marissa Lingen,

mrissa. The frustrations of overly pushy salespeople at industry conventions, in SPAAAAACE. Also, author spotlight.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

jesse_the_k

recs always delight.

Algorithms is indeed the better timeline version of AI, although, as with most of Kritzer's work, the joy comes from making community and connection.

All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt reminds me of a lovely memoir by Sarah Kurchak, I Overcame My Autism and All I Got Was This Lousy Anxiety Disorder. It's on my "write the review!" list and evidently I'm not doing that.

From:

sonia

That sounds like a great memoir, thanks for the rec! And I'm glad to hear you enjoyed the story recs. :-)

The joy in Algorithms comes from community and connection, yes, and also an externalized caring inner voice, unlike the critical one so many of us have.

From:

jesse_the_k

Transforming the inner scold to a kind guide is exactly right. That's what made it Hugo-worthy.

From:

asakiyume

I really liked Marissa Lingen's latest, but I hadn't read the interview until now--it was great. Yeah, I thought, in addition to being an entertaining story, it was a great parable for how people think they can just extract from the environment without consequences when of course that's not true (or not true ultimately). In the story it's because the station is such a closed environment and the idiot salesman is used to planets--but of course our planet is a closed system too.

I've read and enjoyed "Better Living Through Algorithms"; will have to test the waters of the darker story.

From:

sonia

Agreed that the story points to the problem on our own closed-system planet. The selfish, oblivious salesman stands in for a whole lot of billionaires.