Diverse Energies

Jul 02, 2012 Ruby Tombstone rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: dystopia-utopia-anytopia-will-do, okay-okay-its-ya, short-stories, netgalley-arcs

This is a great idea for a YA anthology: A collection of dystopian stories featuring a culturally diverse range of characters reflecting the real world in which we live. I'm not usually a fan of short stories, since I tend to think that most of the good ones would be better explored in a full-length format, but this collection is of higher quality than most. There's a good sense of momentum to the book, and some really unique and exciting ideas behind each story, so for once I didn't get that dr...more

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Nov 26, 2012 Fangs for the Fantasy rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is a book of several YA dystopian short stories that aims for diversity. Much of YA, of speculative fiction and definitely dystopia is extremely white washed and made up entirely of straight people. GBLT people are, largely, dead and POC and women frequently take a back seat to the noble straight, male lead. It’s refreshing to see an anthology of short stories that focus on minorities.

I’m going to sound all kinds of fluffy but I have to say I would have appreciated a happy ending or two. I...more This is a book of several YA dystopian short stories that aims for diversity. Much of YA, of speculative fiction and definitely dystopia is extremely white washed and made up entirely of straight people. GBLT people are, largely, dead and POC and women frequently take a back seat to the noble straight, male lead. It’s refreshing to see an anthology of short stories that focus on minorities.

I’m going to sound all kinds of fluffy but I have to say I would have appreciated a happy ending or two. I know, it’s dystopia and all, but only a couple ended with what could be considered actual happy endings and I do so hate ending on a downer. Overall the book is gritty and dark and sad. But, at the same time, more realistic for it. These are not kids who manage to reach inside themselves and change the world, these aren’t kids who manage to heal all the wounds and these aren’t kids who change the system, lead the revolution and make the world a better place. They aren’t even kids who can escape from their conditions and live better lives – sometimes just surviving is an achievement in these worlds. Which is realistic but… well, grim. The Last Day by Ellen Oh, a story of World War 2 Japan, where Japan didn’t surrender after Nagasaki and Hiroshima – and more cities are wiped out is among the darkest you’ll ever read.

And there’s nothing wrong with a bit of grim here and there, but it does have a different light on the escapism. I do think one of the best stories in this light is Gods of the Dimming Night by Greg van Eekhout where the protagonist refuses to leave his family and become a hero fighting in Ragnarok, instead choosing to bring his family money for power and food.

My main complaint will always be that these are short stories. I’m not a lover of short stories – I feel that they really don’t have the chance to develop themselves. And I think that’s especially true of this book which has 11 stories crammed in there – that’s 11 with a foreward and afterward and it’s not a very long book. Some manage to elegant encompass the entire story in the short story format: Good Girl by Melinda Lo with a tragic love story in a dystopian world obsessed with racial purity. Pattern Recognition by Ken Liu, a story of a rich western corporation exploiting poor POC children to be used as computers. What Arms to Hold by Rajan Khanna is another beautifully tragic story of POC children being used as slaves in the mines, his escape rather than being used as a tool for the revolution. No, it doesn’t end with a resolve but, realistically, there is no good resolve that would come. It has a bittersweet closure of its own.

While these really did well in the short story format, others handled it poorly and, I think, felt more like prologues for something greater. Blue Skies by Cindy Pon sets up a wonderful story where the Haves rule over the Wants and a Want boy kidnapping a Have girl to gain money to try and change society – it has vast potential that is only hinted at in the short story. Freshee’s Frogurt by Daniel H. Wilson was definitely the weakest story in the collection – was mercifully short and barely even established a prologue for a greater dystopia. Why tell the story of the first shots of a war which we never see? Similarly Next Door by Rahul Kanakia, a great story of an extreme class divide and one boy and his boyfriend trying to find their own home, felt like setting up for more. Especially since it appeared in the same book as Blue Skies, it felt like the relationship was introduced as an after-thought since it was brushed on so shallowly.

While they aren’t prologues I also think Uncertainty Principle by K. Tempest Bradford spent a lot of time setting up an extremely complex world with a changing reality and time travel – and how this one girl can see how the time shifts and reality changes. It felt like it was a perfect set up of the world but after all that effort the story ends – it’s a difficult and mind bending concept to fit into a short story. A Pocket Full of Dharma by Paolo Bacigalupi also introduced a complicated world I wanted to see more of – the story itself was relatively self-contained (and bittersweet tragic) but the setting was worth a revisit.

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Nov 04, 2012 Liberty Gilmore rated it 4 of 5 stars

I'm not the hugest fan of short stories. I think there's a really fine balance between a story not worth telling and a story worth giving a novel's worth of words to develop. Balanced on the knife edge between those two things are the really successful short stories.

That doesn't mean to say I don't enjoy a lot of short stories I read - it's just generally I enjoy them with a pinch of resentment, wishing that I had 300 pages, not 15. Most of the stories in Diverse Energies are no exception.

The pr...more I'm not the hugest fan of short stories. I think there's a really fine balance between a story not worth telling and a story worth giving a novel's worth of words to develop. Balanced on the knife edge between those two things are the really successful short stories.

That doesn't mean to say I don't enjoy a lot of short stories I read - it's just generally I enjoy them with a pinch of resentment, wishing that I had 300 pages, not 15. Most of the stories in Diverse Energies are no exception.

The premise of a culturally diverse book featuring protagonists from all cultures, with a bit of LGBT thrown in for good measure, was dreamt up in response to apparent 'whitewashing' of YA literature. I can't say I know much about this, in all honesty, except to say that a lot of the YA books I read feature white, straight protagonists. I expect this has a lot to do with the fact that so many prominent YA writers are white and straight than inherent racism and homophobia in the genre - as the saying goes: write what you know, and I don't feel we should criticise authors for doing that. But, equally, we shouldn't pass over culturally diverse fiction, or LGBT fiction, just because of current trends. Who's to say such a book wouldn't start the next trend, anyway?

Diverse Energies, then, reads like a perfect sampler of different authors who write in these fields. I can't say I didn't enjoy reading any of the stories in the collection, despite my sometimes frustration that they were only short, though Ursula Le Guin and Daniel H. Wilson's offerings were my particular favourites. Each story was exactly what it promised to be - a little pocket of another culture in a dystopian future, equal parts fascinating and frightening in most instances. I was unfamiliar with most of the authors, but I will definitely be on the lookout for opportunities to read their work.

And if everyone who reads Diverse Energies responds in the same way, then perhaps in the future it will be said that the trend of culturally diverse fiction started here.

Rating: 4/5(less)

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Oct 02, 2012 Rachel Brown rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: awesomely-depressing, china, india, japan, science-fiction, short-stories, young-adult

An anthology of dystopian YA short stories with a focus on diversity, ie, most of the protagonists are not white.

As a whole, this anthology is not much like most current YA dystopian novels, which are generally about naïve privileged white girls slowly coming to realize that their “the government controls everything” society actually sucks, while navigating a love triangle. The characters in this anthology are often aware from the get-go that everything sucks, and the central problem is generall...more

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Sep 16, 2012 Katja aka Tink rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

No one can doubt that the wave of the future is not the conquest of the world by a single dogmatic creed but the liberation of the diverse energies of free nations and free men. No one can doubt that cooperation in the pursuit of knowledge must lead to freedom of the mind and freedom of the soul.”
—President John F. Kennedy, from a speech at University of California, March 23, 1962

In a world gone wrong, heroes and villains are not always easy to distinguish and every individual has the ability to...more

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Sep 23, 2012 Mrs. S rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2012-books, read-in-2012

I've mentioned before that I'm not usually crazy about short-story collections, but this is a really great one. These stories represent a wide variety of dystopian/post-apocalyptic/just plain creepy or messed up settings, with characters that are similarly varied. The editors' goal was to take some of the frustration of many writers with the sameness of protagonists (in speculative fiction especially, but this is not a phenomenon unique to genre fiction) and turn it in a productive direction. Th...more I've mentioned before that I'm not usually crazy about short-story collections, but this is a really great one. These stories represent a wide variety of dystopian/post-apocalyptic/just plain creepy or messed up settings, with characters that are similarly varied. The editors' goal was to take some of the frustration of many writers with the sameness of protagonists (in speculative fiction especially, but this is not a phenomenon unique to genre fiction) and turn it in a productive direction. The result was a really excellent anthology of stories with protagonists who were something other than straight white kids from Western countries. And I have to say, the collection succeeds in making it seem really ridiculous that so many of the other stories that get published are about kids who look pretty much the same. Maybe this is just because I spent my days for the last three years with young people from 20+ different countries with a range of skin tones, hair styles, attitudes, favorite foods, religions, favorite subjects, sexual preferences, living arrangements, family makeups, languages, etc, but reading this book felt normal. It made me mentally flip through the last hundred books I read and suddenly that was the collection that felt sort of false. I mean, that's not to say that everyone should stop writing about straight white kids from Western countries. But it's weird that those stories get published so disproportionately.

And lest you think this book serves only as a Good Example or something, let me give you an idea of some of the stories you'll find inside. There's a police report narrated by a frozen-yogurt worker (with killer dude-voice and a completely twisted streak of dark humor) about the day the first robot lost it. There's the story of a boy living safely within the walls of his school who longs to know more about the world outside, and an explanation from the school's founder of why the boy and his friends weren't allowed to that will make you question every dystopian setting you've ever read (at least for a second.) And there's a severely creepy story that's set in unmistakably future Earth, where the rich have all forsaken the real world in favor of a 24/7 virtual world and the poor have started squatting in their (too-often bedbug infested) homes right under their oblivious noses. Those were just a few that stood out to me, but you may have other favorites (like the excellent contributions from Paolo Baciogalupi, Malinda Lo, or Ursula LeGuin.) If you're a fan of dystopian stories, you must give this book a read.

I received a free advance e-book copy in exchange for an honest review.(less)

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Jul 07, 2012 Tintaglia rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: e-books, galleys

Non amo in genere le raccolte di racconti, e anche meno le antologie di autori vari , ma il tema alla base di Diverse energies mi intrigava: in una letteratura YA dominata dai protagonisti di razza bianca (recentissima la polemica su Goodreads per i protagonisti di altre razze “sbiancati” o modificati nelle copertine…) questa raccolta vuole raccogliere racconti che diversifichino, presentando distopie con protagonista, in realtà, la diversità razziale che è realtà non tanto in Europa, quanto neg...more Non amo in genere le raccolte di racconti, e anche meno le antologie di autori vari , ma il tema alla base di Diverse energies mi intrigava: in una letteratura YA dominata dai protagonisti di razza bianca (recentissima la polemica su Goodreads per i protagonisti di altre razze “sbiancati” o modificati nelle copertine…) questa raccolta vuole raccogliere racconti che diversifichino, presentando distopie con protagonista, in realtà, la diversità razziale che è realtà non tanto in Europa, quanto negli Stati Uniti.
La presenza di tre autori come Ken Liu (di cui ho letto il bellisimo The man who ended History), Paolo Bacigalupi (due romanzi in coda di lettura, e un racconto poteva essere l’occasione per conoscerlo) e Ursula K. LeGuin (che non ha bisogno di presentazioni, spero!) e di due autrici che conoscevo di nome ma di cui non ho letto niente (Malinda Lo, particolarmente sensibile anche al tema gay negli YA, e Cindy Pon) mi hanno convinta alla lettura.
Come temevo il risultato è però ineguale. A fianco di alcuni racconti molto belli, ho trovato diverse buone idee che mi sono però parse incompiute in qualche maniera, o raccontate confusamente, e una minoranza di racconti che mi hanno lasciato molto fredda.

The last day di Ellen Oh parte da un’idea geniale. Peccato che la resa sia assolutamente inferiore all’idea: non ho provato né tristezza né orrore – e sì che, considerato che mi sono sentita male durante la visita al Museo di Hiroshima, l’autrice partiva avvantaggiata;

Freshee’s Frogurt di Daniel H. Wilson è un racconto molto scarno, ma divertente e reso con afficacia dal punto di vista linguistico;
di Uncertainty principle di K. Tempest Bradford ho adorato l’idea e la prima parte, mentre ho trovato scadente e conusionaria la soluzione (dalla comparsa della seconda ragazza in poi, diciamo senza spoiler ;));

Pattern recognition conferma Ken Liu un autore intelligente e profondo, e ottimo dal punto di vista stilistico, almeno per quanto mi riguarda;

Gods of dimming light di Greg van Eekhout ha un’idea originalissima e un’ambientazione davvero davvero bella: lascia forse un avgo senso di incompiutezza, ma mi è piaciuto moltissimo;

Next door di Rahul Kanakia mi ha lasciato perplessa: per quanto mi piaccia l’inquietante ambientazione, non sono riuscita a sentirmi coinvolta, probabilmente perché non mi piace minimamento lo stile di scrittura;

Good girl di Malinda Lo è uno di quei racconti che, pur essendomi piaciuto, mi ha lasciato ocn un senso di incompiutezza, forse per il finale aperto, e la mancata soluzione della ricerca inziiale della protagonista, ma anche per la scarsa esplorazione dei sentimenti e della storia che vengono raccontati;

A pocket full of dharma di Paolo Bacigalupi ha un’idea interessante, un’ambientazione affascinante e un’idea (la Biocittà) davvero bella, ma anche qui non è stato al livello che mi aspettavo: lo metterò alla prova nei romanzi;

What arms to hold, Rajan Khanna non mi ha detto nulla in particolare, nè come tema nè come scrittura, e non mi è piaciuto il vago afflato fantasy;

Blue skies di Cindy Pon è per me uno dei migliori racconti della raccolta: pochi tratti, trama minima, ma resa appassionante del passato e del presente dei personaggi, e delle loro diversità;

Solitude di Ursula K. Le Guin è di una bellezza commovente: una riflessione sulle lontananze culturali e sulla loro incolmabilità di una lucidità e chiarezza affascinanti, nello stile squisito della LeGuin. Vale la pena di leggere la raccolta solo per questo (una ristampa, sia detto, non scritto appositamente per la raccolta, come il racconto di Bacigalupi).(less)

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Dec 06, 2012 Hollowspine rated it 5 of 5 stars

If you, like me, are tired of the same old thing, the dystopian futures, the fights against zombies or authoritarian governments waged by white teenaged girls, then this book is for you.

Diverse Energies features stories where the characters are as diverse as the worlds they inhabit. The plots are engaging and absorbing, the writers are superb, and the only problem is that they end too soon, they leave the reader wanting more.

Some of these worlds took place in the far future, some in a world only...more

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Jul 16, 2012 Tina Dalton rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: china, dystopian, family, minority, sci-fi, time-travel, ya, homosexuality

Diverse Energies is a collection of sci-fi short stories that focuses on diversity. The characters of these stories are not the usual white faces of science fiction, and I found the change refreshing. I remember the first time read Orson Scott Card's collection of Mormon-based sci-fi short stories, and how I felt that finally someone had written stories in which I could recognize myself. It is the hope of the editors of this collection that children of diverse and mixed heritages will see themse...more

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Jan 21, 2013 Barbara rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: community, cultural-identity, death, dystopian, families, friendship, ncbla2013, science-fiction

Eleven authors put their spin on our world in the future in this dystopian collection that makes it clear just how badly things have gone awry. As the jacket indicates, it often is quite hard to separate the good folks from the bad ones, and many of the heroic figures make bad decisions. My favorites were "Pattern Recognition" by Ken Liu in which the main characters realize that everything they held true turns out to be false, "Good Girl" by Malinda Lo in which Kyle finds--and loses--love while...more

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Oct 23, 2012 Jessica Strider rated it 4 of 5 stars

Pros: wide variety of dystopian worlds, protagonists of diverse races and sexual orientations

Cons: in several of the stories the characters are in lower class/servile roles to white people,

For Parents: no language, minimal violence, one story hints at sex but there are no descriptions, three of the stories have positive GLTBQ content

This is a great collection of stories. Not only do they feature people of colour in lead roles, there are also several positive portrayals of gay/lesbian teens in...more

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Jan 04, 2013 Jen (Almost Grown-up) rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: dystopia

Posted to Almost Grown-up:

Oh, anthologies… you are so difficult to review. Diverse Energies was an anthology that appealed to me because I usually do enjoy dystopian stories, but have been a little burnt out on them and it focused on stories from underrepresented cultures.

But the thing about reviewing anthologies is that I feel differently about all of the stories in them. In this one thought that some were very strong and some seemed very weak. The anthology opened on a strong note with Ellen...more

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Oct 22, 2012 Pam rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: read-in-2012, ebooks-read-in-2012

I received a copy of this book from NetGalley for an honest review. This is a collection of short stories about dystopian places and culturally diverse people. Each author creates a new world with characters you usually don't see much of in books. Here are a few of the stories i really enjoyed.

Good Girl by Malinda Lo
Kyle is a girl who live in a place where you have to be a pure blood. Mixing of races is not aloud and against the law. The problem is she isn't a pure blood but looks enough like...more I received a copy of this book from NetGalley for an honest review. This is a collection of short stories about dystopian places and culturally diverse people. Each author creates a new world with characters you usually don't see much of in books. Here are a few of the stories i really enjoyed.

Good Girl by Malinda Lo
Kyle is a girl who live in a place where you have to be a pure blood. Mixing of races is not aloud and against the law. The problem is she isn't a pure blood but looks enough like one to pass. When her brother goes missing she heads to the Tunnels where she meets Nix. Nix agrees to help her for a price. As time goes by Kyle begins to fall for Nix which is breaking another law. I enjoyed this story a lot as the world the author create seems like it could happen. The characters stay with you and you want more of the story.

Next Door by Rahul Kanakia
In this world the rich stay hooked up to virtual things and don't even notice when the poor live right in their house along side them. Most of the time infecting the houses with bed bugs. Very neat story about one persons search for a clean place to live and what happens when a rich family does notice them.

Gods of the Dimming Night by Greg Van Eekhout
San Diego hasn't had a summer in three years. It stays winter all the time. When Edward looks for a job he comes across what he thinks may be a dream one. To bad it isn't what it seems. I really like this story as it has Norse mythology as the base of it.

There is a lot more storie in this book these are the ones that stood out the most to me and help give this book a 3. I had high hopes going into this book because I love Distopian books and thought it wold be great with different characters. It fell flat in a lot of stories. Instead of enjoying some of them I was bored or just depressed after reading them. A few like the above ones are what made the book good to me. I liked the story lines, the characters where great and most of the time I wanted more of the stories. I would say this book rates right in the middle for me.(less)

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Mar 19, 2013 RJ rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: ya, scifi, queer, dystopia, magic, short-stories

Wow! What a strong collection. A few felt like great concepts that really needed more space to breathe, but I think that's difficult to avoid in a short form dystopia.

I was initially a little turned off by the first two stories, which are incredibly gruesome (view spoiler), but none of the other were nearly as grisly. I particularly loved the stories by K Tempest Bradford, Malinda Lo...more

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Dec 06, 2012 Tanya Patrice rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: short-stories

A dark collection of dystopian short stories, with diverse settings & characters - one I loved!
The Last Day, Ellen Oh. What a way to start off this collection of short stories. This dystopian society is damn dreary and depressing ... kind of the tone of the entire collection. It's an alternate history of WWII set in Japan. The World has been divided into 2 super-powers - The President of the West and The Emperor of the East - and they are at war. Nobody is winning, and The Emperor has resor...more

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Dec 11, 2012 Alice rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: dystopia-postapocalyptic, ya

Worth reading for nothing else than the stunning Solitude by Ursula K. Le Guin, an absolutely fantastic meditation on cultural relativity that I could not put down. I also enjoyed Next Door by Rahul Kanakia, about a world in which the rich people are basically plugged into the internet all day and ignore the "street people," who are everyone else (and the world is falling apart as a result of the rich people doing jack shit all day while hogging all the resources). I also liked Cindy Pon's Blue...more

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Nov 23, 2012 Deb rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction-dystopian

I received a free copy of this book from NetGalley. It's a science fiction anthology that includes stories from Paolo Bacigalupi and Ursula LeGuin. While I don't read a lot of anthologies, I like the idea of finding new authors to read. The theme of this anthology is diversity. Its editor, Tobias S. Buckell, who is Caribbean and British, explains that he wants science fiction to represent many races and cultures, not just one.

This anthology introduced me to new ideas and authors, and scary visio...more I received a free copy of this book from NetGalley. It's a science fiction anthology that includes stories from Paolo Bacigalupi and Ursula LeGuin. While I don't read a lot of anthologies, I like the idea of finding new authors to read. The theme of this anthology is diversity. Its editor, Tobias S. Buckell, who is Caribbean and British, explains that he wants science fiction to represent many races and cultures, not just one.

This anthology introduced me to new ideas and authors, and scary visions of the future that could very well exist. I skipped around a little, and there are a couple of stories I didn't finish. A few stories I didn't like at first but once I gave them ten pages I was deeply drawn into them. I definitely enjoyed the book as a whole, not just for the statement it's making, but because it's good sci-fi/dystopian fiction. If you like your science fiction heavy on science and technology, this won't be the book for you. But if you're looking for good fiction about strange worlds and cultures, or what race and class conflicts might look like in the future, you'll enjoy this.

Some of my favorites:
"The Last Day" by Ellen Oh. Set in Japan, this story is the closest thing I've ever seen to what it might feel like to be around when a nuclear bomb goes off. I won't forget this story any time soon.
"Good Girl" by Malinda Lo. About a dystopian future where mixed-ethnicity people are considered to have terminal illnesses and forced to live underground. And there's an outside world that nobody's seen.
"A Pocket Full of Dharma" by Paolo Bacigalupi. If you've read Pump Six, Bacigalupi's book of short stories, you'll be disappointed because this story comes from that book. A fascinating story though and one of the best in this collection. Bacigalupi's writing really stands out here, and if you haven't read anything by him, this is a great place to start.
"Blue Skies" by Cindy Pon. A story of the futuristic divide between haves and have-nots. In this story, the "haves" (ten percent of the population) breathe through oxygen tanks and have all kinds of futuristic technology where the "have nots" are lucky if they live till thirty. But the real story here is about a brief human interaction between the two classes.
"Solitude" by Ursula LeGuin. I've had trouble reading LeGuin, having started two of her books and put them both down. This story was different. It's about a woman who is a field ethnologist, someone who studies different cultures. She finds a culture that is extremely difficult to communicate with, and the only way to learn about them is to reside in their village with her two young children. During the time she stays there, her children become so integrated into the culture it becomes impossible to take them from it.

I also enjoyed stories by Ken Liu, Rahul Kanakia, and Rajan Khanna. There were just a few I didn't care for - a couple were too action-oriented for my tastes, and one started out really interesting but lost me after a while. (less)

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Oct 23, 2012 Sarah rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2012, dystopian, netgalley-arc, ebook, 3-stars

The Good

The characters. The majority of the characters in this story were compelling, tragic, and well-developed. Their endings weren't always happy, but they did feel honest, and the way the characters accepted their fates was noble. (I'm a fan of unhappy endings anyway. They're more realistic.)
The plots. The stories themselves, while not always the most well-written, were interesting, intense, and suspenseful. The only story that was the absolute exception to this rule was the final one, w...more

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Nov 19, 2012 Catie rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: for-review, read-in-2012, short-stories, ya, sci-fi, speculative-fiction

3 1/2 stars

I like the idea of this anthology way more that I liked the anthology itself. This world is by no means populated by a white majority, so I think it’s ridiculous that so much of young adult literature is. One of the main things that can make me interested in reading a YA fantasy these days is a non-western setting - perhaps because I’ve read so much western-centric YA. I was really looking forward to reading this anthology, but after finishing it I found it to be mostly forgettable. H...more

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Mar 06, 2013 Steph Su rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: poc, dystopian, sci-fi

DIVERSE ENERGIES is like a Halloween trick-or-treat bag: you get some real good ‘uns, but you also get some duds that you always kind of throw back into the bag and hope that you don’t pull out again in your next swipe. It’s definitely a worthwhile read for those interested in the intersection of SFF with POC (hah, so many acronyms), particularly if you enjoy or don’t mind short stories. However, I’m not sure it had the comprehensive punch required for it to break out of its niche for the time b...more

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Oct 25, 2012 Bibliotropic rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: netgalley

Many truly depressing futures are showcased in Diverse Energies. From violent wars to exploitation to impossible-to-bridge gaps between the rich and poor...Wait, doesn't this sound familiar? Doesn't this sound precisely like what's in the news today?

That's what makes these futures so believable, I think. Every single story in this compilation deals with a future that's all too easy to see happening. This isn't science fiction taking place on other planets, with people and situations that are too...more Many truly depressing futures are showcased in Diverse Energies. From violent wars to exploitation to impossible-to-bridge gaps between the rich and poor...Wait, doesn't this sound familiar? Doesn't this sound precisely like what's in the news today?

That's what makes these futures so believable, I think. Every single story in this compilation deals with a future that's all too easy to see happening. This isn't science fiction taking place on other planets, with people and situations that are too distant from our own lives to really feel a connection to. These are futures that we already know have seeds planted. Exploitation of workers overseas. The poor left to struggle and die in polluted worlds while the rich have the luxury of health and clean air and water. A vicious divide between "eastern" and "western" cultures. These are things we can see bits and pieces of just by turning on the news. The stories are relatable, understandable, easily evoking empathy from any reader.

And true to advertisement, anyone who's looking for minorities to get some literary screentime in speculative fiction should take a look at this book. Very few stories even contained white characters, and most of the ones who did were not protagonists. If it wasn't minorities by culture, it was minorities by sexuality. Sometimes both. The characters here were as diverse as humanity itself, and it was a welcome break from fiction that revolves around North America's accomplishments and station in the global community.

There was only one story where it really felt as though a character of colour was shoehorned in, where it would have made absolutely no difference to the tale whatsoever. A story about a robot on a murderous rampage was told from the perspective of one who was attacked, giving a report to a law enforcement officer. The law enforcement officer had Osage heritage. This was mentioned in 2 lines of dialogue, as an aside. It added nothing to the story. It didn't take anything away, sure, and perhaps that was the point. That it doesn't take much to add a bit of diversity to a story. I'm not sure. But to me, it seemed as though the lines were added as an afterthought, a quick way to throw in an attempt at diversity without actually doing so.

But aside from that one story, the diversity shown in this novel was excellent, and could serve as a great lesson to many, readers and writers alike. You want a story that stands out, then don't create your story from the same cookie-cutter ideas that have been done time and time again. People who aren't straight and white want characters to relate to too. I know I do! (I've mentioned in the past how difficult it can be to find characters who are asexual as a sexual preference, and how hard it can be for me to relate to characters who are driven by sexual urges.)

If you're looking for some good diversity in your speculative fiction, if you want a glimpse at the futures of places that aren't North American, if you want to see some minorities take the stage, then reach for a copy of Diverse Energies. It's worth your time.(less)

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Oct 13, 2012 Bookworm1858 rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: read-2012, dystopia, netgalley, ya-read

I was grabbed by the mention of three of these authors who have either written books I enjoyed or have written books I hope to read soon (those three being Ellen Oh, Malinda Lo, and Cindy Pon). Its stated intention is to provide more diversity in our YA fiction, whether race, gender, culture, sexual-orientation, etc. These stories mix dystopia, science-fiction, and fantasy. Like many short story collections, it's a definite mixed bag with some stories working well for me and some not clicking wi...more I was grabbed by the mention of three of these authors who have either written books I enjoyed or have written books I hope to read soon (those three being Ellen Oh, Malinda Lo, and Cindy Pon). Its stated intention is to provide more diversity in our YA fiction, whether race, gender, culture, sexual-orientation, etc. These stories mix dystopia, science-fiction, and fantasy. Like many short story collections, it's a definite mixed bag with some stories working well for me and some not clicking with me.

The Last Day by Ellen Oh-what a powerful story and a great way to start the collection! Atomic non-stop war between the President of the West and the Emperor of the West with nowhere safe for the people.

Freshee's Frogurt by Daniel H. Wilson-Interesting story about robots going berserk and attacking humans; warning about language. Not one of my favorites as it's very short and just focusing on this one battle.

Uncertainty Principle by K. Tempest Bradford-was really interesting and played with time, one of my favorite concepts. A young girl keeps having time shifted around her with no one else noticing until the day she uploads all the times it has happened and she is contacted by others to do something about it.

Pattern Recognition by Ken Liu-I really loved this story although there was an awkward shift at the end, hopefully due to the fact that this is an ebook. I wasn't really sure where it was going but I loved the main characters. It made me think of Ender's Game a little bit, which is a good thing as that's one of my favorite books.

Gods of Dimming Light by Greg van Eekhout-I didn't really like this one; it felt a bit more on the violent side featuring a young Indonesian boy discovering a Norse connection.

Next Door by Rahul Kanakia-This was very weird to me: there are haves and have-nots, the former don't even notice the latter being so plugged into their technology and I didn't quite understand that even as I know people are always talking about how technology is isolating us but I could not imagine not noticing other people in the way that the haves do here.

Good Girl by Malinda Lo-did I mention that all of these stories are pretty uniformly depressing? This was definitely one of those with our main character searching the underworld for her brother, meeting a love interest, and confronting the grim reality of her world.

A Pocket Full of Dharma by Paolo Bacigalupi-I didn't really know what to make of this story, about a boy on the streets and trying to survive among conniving adults in a bleak world. What's in his pocket? It's not a ring of power for one.

Blue Skies by Cindy Pon-I thought this was another really good story, especially because it seemed a little lighter and it had a hint of romance. Although such romance is impossible in the world, I liked the little hit within.

What Arms to Hold by Rajan Khanna-Indian children labor in a mine, searching for a big prize that will ensure their promotion to a better job...guess what? That's not exactly the case as is so heartbreakingly shown here.

Solitude by Ursula K. Le Guin-I'm not really sure I got this story, which was one of the longest included. It's about a woman who uses her son and daughter to explore and study a foreign culture on another planet.(less)

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Dec 29, 2012 Amy rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: utopia-dystopia, asia, young-adult

Really liking this so far. Lots of the stories are above average. I especially loved "Uncertainty Principle" by K. Tempest Bradford. I'm looking forward to the Le Guin story... the reason the cover caught my eye was her name. I marked this "asia" because many of the stories have an Eastern POV or author. Diverse perspectives, as the title promises, on our future.

This was so good! I liked K Tempest Bradford and Ursula K Le Guin (of course) best. Checking out "Federations" to sample another Bradfo...more

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Dec 15, 2012 Mitchell rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: science-fiction, short-stories, public-library

This is a short story collection who's conceit is that it is not a story of straight western white males set in typical locations. Just having an exotic location or exotic names in a story does not make a good story. And just being in a specific location and therefore needing to be familiarized or confused by such a location does not make a good story. These stories however pretty much had what it takes. A bit darker than I look but otherwise - well-written, interesting, mostly by authors that I...more

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Sep 03, 2012 Kiesha rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I read an advanced reader's copy of this book that I picked up at the ALA conference in Anaheim earlier this year and I can't wait to get my hands on more works by some of the authors included in this collection. I particularly enjoyed Malinda Lo's 'Good Girl' and Cindy Pon's 'Blue Skies.' I love works by authors that celebrate sexual and multiethnic diversity.

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Jul 20, 2012 Linda rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

A fascinating glimpse of futuristic heroes, villains in the future; gripping, insightful, grim yet hopeful. I'm in awe of the skillful, talented writers, including Ursula K. Le Guin, who contributed to this science fiction YA collection. Librarians and teachers will appreciate the unique viewpoints and find this a Must-Have for their teen readers.

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Oct 12, 2012 Vernieda rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: young-adult, anthology, characters-of-color, poc-author, science-fiction, dystopian

3.5 stars, really.

So most of the stories in this antho were good, quality-wise, but I'm not sure I enjoyed them. The majority were unrelentingly depressing! I'm not sure I can ever read the majority of them again.

My favorites were the stories by Malinda Lo, K.Tempest Bradford & Ken Liu.

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Jan 14, 2013 Victoria Law rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: books-i-read-in-tandem-with-my-daug, dystopia, book-by-writer-of-color

I usually find short story collections a mixed bag, but I found every one of these stories really really really really good. Some of them I wished were longer, or were part of longer books (like Malinda Lo's "Good Girl"). Some of them floored me. One or two I thought were simply good, but not amazing.

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Apr 17, 2013 Caddiewoodlawn rated it 4 of 5 stars

I loved reading the Epilogue and finding out the back story of this anthology. It was an active response to the public outcry for broader diversity in fantasy and scifi, a strange place for sexism, homophobia, and racism to yet endure.

Solitude was my favorite, but I also enjoyed Pattern Recognition and The Uncertainty Principle.

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Feb 25, 2013 Mrs. Kenyon rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: wannabees-14-15, 1-2013-books

A short story collection by YA authors for YA. It was a very enjoyable read, but about half the stories fell flat. As far as Wannabee material, I'm keeping fingers crossed for a different story collection.

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