Michele Lee

Paolo Bacigalupi’s collection starts, no introduction or ease-in, with “Pocketful of Dharma”, an eastern flavored science fiction tale of a Chinese beggar who stumbles into a hostage scheme that can only be birthed by a tech-heavy future. At the center of the tale is a living building, akin to a bonsai tree, that the city is literally growing as a monstrous tenement for its masses. The elements of darkness–the destitute conditions of the beggars, the violence of the street, the conspiracy and the underlying creepiness to the living building–are very carefully balanced to make this a tale, not of horror, but a surreal semblance of the world we know.

“The Fluted Girl” is a stunningly beautiful, but quite perverted story similar to Jennifer Pelland’s “The Last Stand of the Elephant Man”. Chemicals have made it possible for artists to live forever in the prime of their life. This has led from a media crazed world to one where the stars rule fiefdoms with insanely loyal servants, often controlled through chemicals or baser manipulations. Lidia and Nia are the literal creations of Belari, her attempt to break free of the man who created her and still possesses a lingering control of her. The twisted lengths Belari has gone to are enough to turn a reader’s stomach, not from gore, but sheer perverseness. However there’s a surreal beauty to the prose, as well as to Belari’s creations and their bizarre performance.

In “The People of Sand and Slag” humanity, through technology, has completely removed itself from the food chain. Once people could eat anything (and survive anything) other concerns, like the environment, conservation and pollution, dropped significantly in importance. In the wastelands of Antarctica three modified killer guards find an ordinary, living dog that has somehow survived the acid pools and slag wastelands of the excavation. What follows in their decision to keep it or not is a musing commentary on human nature in the speculative future that is not too far from what can be found today. This one is another sad tale full of startling beauty and insight.

“The Pasho” takes readers to a pseudo-Middle East, years after “The Cleansing”, a vaguely mentioned plague that purified the world of overpopulation. The world hasn’t forgotten the time and technology of before, however. A monk-like sect still holds and protects the knowledge, following the belief that before the cleansing the technological power came too fast and now knowledge must be earned slowly, cautiously. Precariously balanced in an area commonly torn by war the Pasho try to improve the lives of those around them without giving rise to the negative uses of technology and advancement. The Pasho Raphel returns home to his highly traditional Jai village only to be shunned by some for choosing the Pasho path. In a complex turn of events Raphel finds his traditional upbringing clashing with his neutral path of knowledge. This one is an interesting tale more for its familiar feel than from voyaging to new worlds.

“The Calorie Man” is a strange hybrid of the heart of India and the heart of the Mississippi, two cultures that aren’t that different under Bacigalupi’s treatment. A testament to the delicate balance of power in this tale a series of blights (pest and fungal rots) has killed off all the natural crops of the world. Luckily a few companies have stepped forward with high quality, high calorie grains that are immune to the blights. Unclear of his own motivations an Indian transplant, Lalji, agrees to voyage up the Mississippi in search of a geneticist, and man hunted by the companies for a very good reason. The three competing themes never come completely together, but the result is a multi-angled tale similar in feel to the recent film “Children of Men”.

“The Tamarisk Hunter” takes a different angle on speculations of a future with disappearing water. In the west the northern cities have been banned from using the water flowing through them for the sake of the heavier population of Southern California. With no care for the rest of the populace cities like L.A. and Las Vegas are suing to have other cities shut down and sealing up the river so that the water can neither evaporate nor seep into the ground. A few people, like Lolo, make a living and collect a water bounty by hunting water guzzling trees like the tamarisk. But even sharing tiny amounts of the available water is too much for the hated “Calis”. Unlike most of the previous stories this one abandons a hopeful or positive ending, opting instead to leave a dry spot in readers’ throats.

Each story explores a darker side to the attainment of technological goals and “Pop Squad” tells the sinister tale of human immortality, which renders procreation not only needless, but illegal. The lead is a cop whose sole job is to hunt down illegal breeders, arresting the adults and executing the children. Bacigalupi weaves a delicate line, in the tale and in the lead’s mentality, between the selfishness of the child-free immortal life and the degrading influences birthing and raising children has on the human mind and body. This tale is largely a mental voyage, but the action invokes a dread that ensures the reader wishes to remain in an indecisive mind rather than face reality.

“The Yellow Card Man” takes readers back to the world of “The Calorie Man”, where the food source is highly controlled by rich corporations thanks to an oddly time triple scourge of blights. This tale is centered in Bangkok, around a man named Tranh who used to be a very successful business man and is now just one of a mass of unwelcome immigrants, hated and abused and not young enough, fast enough or strong enough to survive. Closer to a true horror story this tale abandons the hopeful tinge of its predecessors.

The only true horror tale in the book “Softer” is a sociopathic tale of a man who kills his wife and the effect it has on his mind and his life. Like the others the thread of darkness is delicately mixed into the story. The overwhelming influence of lighter, more positive aspects of the story versus the darker leave the reader with an unsettled feeling that is rare even in more traditional horror fiction.

“Pump Six” edges of the collection away from future where humanity has advanced and instead shows a future where humanity is degrading back toward primate ancestors. A few problem solvers still exist, but the mechanics that keep the city water clean and factories running are failing. With this tale the collection eases the reader back away from a science fiction future and back into a familiar world with frustrations that any reader can sympathize with.

Last is “Small Offerings”, one more cautionary tale wherein children suffer for the sins of the parents. In this one prenatal care is less about the health of a pregnant mother and the infant and more of a clean up crew for what slips out of the birth canal. The shortest of the collection’s tales it also hits close to home, reflecting the staggering growth of learning disorders and mental impairments, most still without a cause in the current time. But in Bacigalupi’s future the damages haunt prospective parents, driving them to dramatic ends to birth their future.

“Pump Six and other stories” is a superb collection of dark science fantasy which should be a must read for fan of the genres.