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Black Swan
2010 Sidewise Award Nominee Best Short-Form Alternate History
Bruce Sterling brings us a tale of espionage, cyber-threats, alternate realities and intrigue in “Black Swan”, a dark and cyberpunk novelette.
Luca is a technology blogger looking for anything newsworthy. ‘Massimo Montaldo’ is the nickname of hacker living on the fringe of society. What can happen when these two very different people meet each other?
Massimo has discovered something, something that could shift the balance of power among the superpowers of the world. A Black Swan.
What is a Black Swan? “A black swan, when it arrives, cannot even be recognized as a black swan. When the black swan assaults us, with the wingbeats of some rapist Jupiter, then we must rewrite history.”
As a journalist, Luca must investigate, learn the truth – or should he? What if this is all beyond him, beyond his ability to fully grasp? Memristors? Euro-Liras? Spies and the possibility of an Alternate Italy?
What if the risk is too high, the danger too great?
Warring between what is safe and what is right, Luca had to decide if reporting the truth is worth the risk…
Bruce Sterling brings us a tale of espionage, cyber-threats, alternate realities and intrigue in “Black Swan”, a dark and cyberpunk novelette.
Luca is a technology blogger looking for anything newsworthy. ‘Massimo Montaldo’ is the nickname of hacker living on the fringe of society. What can happen when these two very different people meet each other?
Massimo has discovered something, something that could shift the balance of power among the superpowers of the world. A Black Swan.
What is a Black Swan? “A black swan, when it arrives, cannot even be recognized as a black swan. When the black swan assaults us, with the wingbeats of some rapist Jupiter, then we must rewrite history.”
As a journalist, Luca must investigate, learn the truth – or should he? What if this is all beyond him, beyond his ability to fully grasp? Memristors? Euro-Liras? Spies and the possibility of an Alternate Italy?
What if the risk is too high, the danger too great?
Warring between what is safe and what is right, Luca had to decide if reporting the truth is worth the risk…
34 pages, Kindle Edition
First published September 8, 2010
32 people are currently reading
269 people want to read
About the author
Bruce Sterling
356 books1,205 followersBruce Sterling is an author, journalist, critic and a contributing editor of Wired magazine. Best known for his ten science fiction novels, he also writes short stories, book reviews, design criticism, opinion columns and introductions to books by authors ranging from Ernst Jünger to Jules Verne. His non-fiction works include The Hacker Crackdown: Law and Disorder on the Electronic Frontier (1992), Tomorrow Now: Envisioning the Next Fifty Years (2003) and Shaping Things (2005).
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 30 reviews
February 10, 2011
As deceptively inviting as its title may be, Bruce Sterling’s Black Swan is not the source material for Darren Aronofsky’s twisted tale of tutus. Nor is it a novelization of the Oscar-nominated film. Nor a novelette-ization, as it were.
Sterling’s novelette begins not with the bombastic prose equivalent of Natalie Portman dancing en pointe to Clint Mansell’s rearrangement of Tchaikovsky but with a modest -- save for the relative weight of a character’s name -- pair of sentences.
The story is narrated by the self-described “ethical journalist” Luca, who runs a semi-popular blog centered on potentially industry-shaking technological advancements. Many of these innovations are blogged about by Luca (in a world of “too few newspapers, and too much Internet”) only after being tipped off by Massimo, who is a skilled and enigmatic hacker.
On their meeting at an Italian cafe in which this science fiction story starts, Massimo proffers Luca an object so advanced that it would have easily inspired a neologism from Sterling, who is himself credited for coining the term slipstream, had the term that is ultimately used, memristor, not already been available. Memristors are theoretical electronic devices whose applications compose a far-reaching set. “A chip with memristors,” Luca believes, “was like a racetrack where the jockeys rode unicorns.” It’s a somewhat ludicrous comparison, but one forgives Sterling for evoking a rather discordant image of athletic men riding glimmering magical equine beings. The Hugo-winning author, it turns out, is not above using unicorns in his figures of speech, if only so that he can emphasize the capacity of his subject. And what great capacity memristors have -- so great that should Luca blog about their existence, in the wrong hands, in the wrong electronics company, memristors are certain to tilt the global axis of power. Luca is as yet undecided, while Massimo is “shaking: with rage, romantic heartbreak” -- he just got dumped by a Turinese woman for none other than the French president Nicolas Sarkozy -- “and frustrated fury. He was also drunk.”
Most importantly, Massimo comes from another world.
What starts as a seemingly innocuous conversation between the journalist/blogger (Is there still a difference?) and his source eventually leads to a side-along laptop-assisted teleportation to a parallel Italy in a parallel world where Nicolas Sarkozy is supposedly a fugitive wanted for turning “the south of France upside down.” It’s also a world where the climate is noticeably different from that of Luca’s.
Black Swan contains a large enough amount of socio-political commentary and prognostications to be current even as it meddles with alternate reality and conceptual technology, but fortunately it’s far from being didactic. On the contrary, it’s a fairly engaging amalgamation of all too familiar facts of life and science fiction. There is an uneven texture to how the story unfolds, foregoing significant back story in favor of the next big reveal, but whether it’s attributable to the plot urgency of the short form or to the narrative shortcuts indicative of blogging overpowering the journalistic sensibilities of the narrator is basically beside the point. Conclusively, Black Swan is about black swans: certainly not about reincarnations of the female antagonist in Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake, but about the concept of exceptionally exceptional events or persons discussed at length by epistemologist Nassim Nicholas Taleb in his 2007 book, The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable. In Black Swan, Sterling writes to striking effect,
Ultimately we must rewrite history in all the physically possible worlds, not least of which ours.
--
Originally posted at The Polysyllabic Spree.
Sterling’s novelette begins not with the bombastic prose equivalent of Natalie Portman dancing en pointe to Clint Mansell’s rearrangement of Tchaikovsky but with a modest -- save for the relative weight of a character’s name -- pair of sentences.
The ethical journalist protects a confidential source. So I protected “Massimo Montaldo,” although I knew that wasn’t his name.
The story is narrated by the self-described “ethical journalist” Luca, who runs a semi-popular blog centered on potentially industry-shaking technological advancements. Many of these innovations are blogged about by Luca (in a world of “too few newspapers, and too much Internet”) only after being tipped off by Massimo, who is a skilled and enigmatic hacker.
On their meeting at an Italian cafe in which this science fiction story starts, Massimo proffers Luca an object so advanced that it would have easily inspired a neologism from Sterling, who is himself credited for coining the term slipstream, had the term that is ultimately used, memristor, not already been available. Memristors are theoretical electronic devices whose applications compose a far-reaching set. “A chip with memristors,” Luca believes, “was like a racetrack where the jockeys rode unicorns.” It’s a somewhat ludicrous comparison, but one forgives Sterling for evoking a rather discordant image of athletic men riding glimmering magical equine beings. The Hugo-winning author, it turns out, is not above using unicorns in his figures of speech, if only so that he can emphasize the capacity of his subject. And what great capacity memristors have -- so great that should Luca blog about their existence, in the wrong hands, in the wrong electronics company, memristors are certain to tilt the global axis of power. Luca is as yet undecided, while Massimo is “shaking: with rage, romantic heartbreak” -- he just got dumped by a Turinese woman for none other than the French president Nicolas Sarkozy -- “and frustrated fury. He was also drunk.”
Most importantly, Massimo comes from another world.
What starts as a seemingly innocuous conversation between the journalist/blogger (Is there still a difference?) and his source eventually leads to a side-along laptop-assisted teleportation to a parallel Italy in a parallel world where Nicolas Sarkozy is supposedly a fugitive wanted for turning “the south of France upside down.” It’s also a world where the climate is noticeably different from that of Luca’s.
”That’s climate change,” said Massimo. “Not in this Italy -- in your Italy. In your Italy, you’ve got a messed-up climate. In this Italy, it’s the human race that’s messed-up...”
Black Swan contains a large enough amount of socio-political commentary and prognostications to be current even as it meddles with alternate reality and conceptual technology, but fortunately it’s far from being didactic. On the contrary, it’s a fairly engaging amalgamation of all too familiar facts of life and science fiction. There is an uneven texture to how the story unfolds, foregoing significant back story in favor of the next big reveal, but whether it’s attributable to the plot urgency of the short form or to the narrative shortcuts indicative of blogging overpowering the journalistic sensibilities of the narrator is basically beside the point. Conclusively, Black Swan is about black swans: certainly not about reincarnations of the female antagonist in Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake, but about the concept of exceptionally exceptional events or persons discussed at length by epistemologist Nassim Nicholas Taleb in his 2007 book, The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable. In Black Swan, Sterling writes to striking effect,
A stroke of genius is a black swan, beyond prediction, beyond expectation. If a black swan never arrives, how on Earth could its absence be guessed?
A black swan can never be predicted, expected, or categorized. A black swan, when it arrives, cannot be recognized as a black swan. When the black swan assaults us, with the wingbeats of some rapist Jupiter, then we must rewrite history.
Ultimately we must rewrite history in all the physically possible worlds, not least of which ours.
--
Originally posted at The Polysyllabic Spree.
October 15, 2010
Devo dire che questo tipo di racconti per me è difficile. Amo le realtà alternative e il concetto del libro è originale. C'è una specie di idea audace nel racconto, che credo sia proprio un'idea da scrittore, quella che il potere della creazione sia a disposizione di chi ha l'ardire di immaginarlo. Inoltre credo che il finale del racconto sia davvero inaspettato.
Quello che ho trovato difficile, e che mi ha un po' reso difficile la lettura, sono i riferimenti politici, economici, culturali, tutte quelle considerazioni che ci si aspetta appunto da un giornalista. Ammetto che è un mio limite, perché in un racconto cerco di più l'aspetto dell'evasione che quello della riflessione. Questo racconto, insomma, per certi tratti sembra di più un saggio e questo mi ha messo un po' a disagio.
Quello che ho trovato difficile, e che mi ha un po' reso difficile la lettura, sono i riferimenti politici, economici, culturali, tutte quelle considerazioni che ci si aspetta appunto da un giornalista. Ammetto che è un mio limite, perché in un racconto cerco di più l'aspetto dell'evasione che quello della riflessione. Questo racconto, insomma, per certi tratti sembra di più un saggio e questo mi ha messo un po' a disagio.
April 3, 2011
Ho sempre amato il tema delle realtà alternative, e questo racconto me l'ha ricordato. Avrei voluto esplorare insieme a Sterling tutte le Italie possibili, tutte le varie dimensioni sociopolitiche, invece accidenti a lui, quanto è stato breve! In compenso mi ha ricordato anche quanto mi piacesse il telefilm Sliders, una decina di anni fa!
March 1, 2011
One of the newer topics, and by newer I mean several years but new to many, is is membrane fiction. We have always had sci-fi about multiple world in other dimensions, but with the advent of a growing scientific camp of believers in Brane Theory (part of String Theory). My hopes are that this story is a primer for a longer story. Lucas, the unwitting traveller in this transdimensional trip, is likable and a character I want to learn more about. His plight of not feeling exuberant about a new dimension to explore is a fascinating dynamic. Overall I would not recommend this to the lite reader. While it is not full of quantum or Sting mechanics to mire you in science too much it is a story with a deep concept.
October 1, 2010
Sociologia, politica, economia in una scheggia di domani sospesa tra cinismo e disincanto. Thanks, Bruce, for yet another chilly draft that blows in from your future...
July 24, 2017
This could have been a novel. I wanted more.
April 8, 2012
Un hacker di "mondi", con lo pseudonimo di Massimo Montaldo ma a 'sto punto poteva chiamarsi pure Mario Mondi [che simpaticone che sono!!!], con in mano una tecnologia capace di stravolgere le sorti dell'umanità, e un blogger sensazionalista che su una tale scoperta non se la sente di speculare. E poi Sarkozy come Napoleone, Calvino come fisico invece che letterato, e la Yugoslavia padrona del mondo occidentale. E non è nemmeno male, come idea...
May 10, 2012
Mah! (sospensione del giudizio nel 2010)
Ripreso in mano adesso, nel 2012, raddoppio il rating a 4 stelline.
Forse mi ha aiutato la recente rilettura di "Lezioni Americane" o la dipartita di Sarkozy, ma l'ho apprezzato di più.
Domani partirò per Torino e spero di ritrovarla come l'ho lasciata.
Fermi con il tasto F2, vi prego!
September 27, 2010
Pretty trippy exploration of alternate histories and realities .. and a few apearances by Nicholas Sarkozy. Reminds me of Inception, in that I'll have to read it again in a few days to fully process.
January 3, 2023
A nice short story but I wouldn't call it "cyberpunk"
January 4, 2020
Per essere un romanzo del 2010, il soggetto delle realta' parallele e' un po' vecchio, e questo racconto aggiunge proprio poco. Le idee dei vari mondi alternativi possono essere carine, per quanto stra-abusate. Ma oltre a questo la trama risulta un po' ridicola.
July 29, 2022
Another good story from Sterling. I like all of his books so far. This was a good one that had me shocked to have it end so quickly. I'll leave it at that. A short read.
July 21, 2014
Tem sido evidente que Sterling se apaixonou pela ideia de Europa de uma forma que só o turista prolongado consegue. Fascinado pela elegância italiana, celebridades francesas, capacidade alcoólatra ex-jugoslava, pelas complexidades rizomáticas da intricada cultura europeia que admira pelo optimismo progressista. Haja alguém que ainda acredite no sonho europeu. Ou isso ou sabe-lhe demasiado bem enrolar a língua com nomes estranhos ao inglês texano. Este antigo enfant terrible do cyberpunk metamorfoseou-se em guru da tecnologia e isso sente-se na sua ficção. Suspeito que os contos que vai publicando aqui e ali sejam escritos para se convencer de que ainda consegue escrever mais qualquer coisa que não seja insigths potentes sobre as armadilhas da era digital, algo em que é muito bom.
Este é um caso típico. Percebe-se o deslumbre pela forma como utiliza a iconografia pan-europeísta com toques de hipermodernidade tecnológica. As personagens são os prototípicos entes do novo mundo digital, desde o blogger que vive de scoops ao hacker sombrio, sem esquecer as personalidades vácuas dos media e a modernidade decorativa e arquitectónica que preserva o clássico pitoresco. Dá uns toques cyberpunk com uma história sobre realidades paralelas criadas colapsando probabilidades quânticas de acordo com a interferência do observador. Mas o que realmente o deslumbra é imagem soalheira do pan-europeísmo chic, mescla de elegância, fascínio tecnológico, arquitectura pitoresca das velhas cidades e traços de carácter nacionalistas, que acabam por levar a primazia nestas suas mais recentes histórias. Isto é o Bruce Sterling de Holy Fire, versão redux, longe do Sterling de Schismatrix. Mas sublinhe-se que um Sterling mediano é mais acutilante, interessante e observador da modernidade do que excelência de muitos, por isso vale sempre a pena ler. É como mergulhar no Beyond the Beyond ou no Tumblr, com ficção a substituir as realidades de ponta.
Este é um caso típico. Percebe-se o deslumbre pela forma como utiliza a iconografia pan-europeísta com toques de hipermodernidade tecnológica. As personagens são os prototípicos entes do novo mundo digital, desde o blogger que vive de scoops ao hacker sombrio, sem esquecer as personalidades vácuas dos media e a modernidade decorativa e arquitectónica que preserva o clássico pitoresco. Dá uns toques cyberpunk com uma história sobre realidades paralelas criadas colapsando probabilidades quânticas de acordo com a interferência do observador. Mas o que realmente o deslumbra é imagem soalheira do pan-europeísmo chic, mescla de elegância, fascínio tecnológico, arquitectura pitoresca das velhas cidades e traços de carácter nacionalistas, que acabam por levar a primazia nestas suas mais recentes histórias. Isto é o Bruce Sterling de Holy Fire, versão redux, longe do Sterling de Schismatrix. Mas sublinhe-se que um Sterling mediano é mais acutilante, interessante e observador da modernidade do que excelência de muitos, por isso vale sempre a pena ler. É como mergulhar no Beyond the Beyond ou no Tumblr, com ficção a substituir as realidades de ponta.
July 1, 2014
I'm reviewing the English version of this short story, "Black Swam."
Black Swan is the story of two men in two of many alternate-reality Turins, that can be traversed using a properly configured laptop. About half the story is like the start of a fairly typical journalist-accidentally-uncovers-gigantic-political-scandal, but then dragged by a possible informer from one Turin to another, our hero suddenly becomes as a wooden statue, offering no insights or even personal opinions about the differences. The story ends abruptly and inexplicably as if Sterling just got sick of it.
The writing isn't exactly the best either. There are a few passages where the dialogue seemed downright amateurish. I know some writers try to reproduce in English the particular flair of Italian. Michael Dibdin could do it. Sterling can't.
Black Swan is the story of two men in two of many alternate-reality Turins, that can be traversed using a properly configured laptop. About half the story is like the start of a fairly typical journalist-accidentally-uncovers-gigantic-political-scandal, but then dragged by a possible informer from one Turin to another, our hero suddenly becomes as a wooden statue, offering no insights or even personal opinions about the differences. The story ends abruptly and inexplicably as if Sterling just got sick of it.
The writing isn't exactly the best either. There are a few passages where the dialogue seemed downright amateurish. I know some writers try to reproduce in English the particular flair of Italian. Michael Dibdin could do it. Sterling can't.
January 16, 2014
Breve racconto ambientato a Torino tra il cyberpunk e realtà parallele, scritto con uno stile molto scarno e asciutto (e magari qualcuno lo criticherebbe perché “mostra” ben poco), a me tutto sommato è piaciuto, tenendo conto che è veramente molto breve... mi ha fatto pensare all'incipit di un romanzo più lungo, e che sopporto sempre meno gli autori che infilano Berlusconi nei loro romanzi, Sterling lo “salvo” giusto perché è una citazione molto breve e dopo non ci ritorna più.
Come altri libri di 40k che ho letto, anche quest'ultimo se da un lato è ben impaginato, curato... è anche troppo caro.
Come altri libri di 40k che ho letto, anche quest'ultimo se da un lato è ben impaginato, curato... è anche troppo caro.
July 12, 2015
Il racconto è breve e scorre via senza problemi. Pero' qualcosa non mi ha convinto. Non mi convince innanzi tutto il finale (c'e' un finale?), come non mi convince la definizione "Cyberpunk" nel sottotitolo, che mi pare c'entri davvero poco col contesto del libro.
La storia è ben scritta e interessante, ma non mi ha appassionato tanto (anche alla luce del prezzo, forse eccessivo per una storia che si finisce in 90 minuti) da consigliarne l'acquisto.
La storia è ben scritta e interessante, ma non mi ha appassionato tanto (anche alla luce del prezzo, forse eccessivo per una storia che si finisce in 90 minuti) da consigliarne l'acquisto.
June 16, 2012
Enjoyed this, but I think the author took the concept as far as he was willing to go with it and then dropped it without much care - like he realized how unwieldy the background was and how much more space he'd need to develop a story involving everything he'd already touched on, and realizing that, decided that it was better to end it quickly.
August 9, 2011
Short story (a little overpriced) about an Italian tech blogger and a louche "source" who can travel among alternate Italies. It's all about the premise---the author doesn't actually develop a story from his set up. Readable, though.
October 19, 2011
Good, but it felt more like the elevator pitch for a story rather than a self-contained story itself. It would be interesting to read this fleshed out to a moderate length. However, if you're looking for a quick, engaging short story, it's worth your time.
December 9, 2017
Nada que ver con el Black Swan de Nassim Taleb. Relato corto (y oscuro, muy oscuro) sobre la posibilidad de los múltiples universos y las interacciones entre ellos. Creo que es lo primero que leo de Bruce Sterling y me ha dejado bastante frío, la verdad
April 9, 2011
Downloaded for free, this is a fun story about multiple worlds, speculating as Sterling does best about the ripple effects of our political and social choices.
October 31, 2011
I can feel this story building into something really spectacular, I'm excited for what new Sterling universes await...
January 5, 2012
Decent story, but $3 for a short story is a bit steep. Thought I was buying a book.
March 1, 2012
Ok story on alternate realities, but nothing really new to see here. Also it is a short story and not a novel so not really worth 2.99 to me.
August 25, 2016
http://booksandcappuccino.blogspot.it...
Non mi e piaciuto...
Non mi e piaciuto...
July 9, 2012
Very interesting short story. I picked it up and couldn't put it down. Very well told and worth your time.
August 11, 2013
False
April 6, 2016
I think I liked this black swan better than the other one. Short story.
August 20, 2011
Short story. Really fun. Read it in under an hour.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 30 reviews