New Space Opera

Mars #4 - Maelstrom

by Gardner Dozois & Jonathan Strahan (Editor)

The brightest names in science fiction pen all-new tales of space and wonder.

Contents
1 • Introduction (The New Space Opera) • (2007) • essay by Gardner Dozois and Jonathan Strahan
6 • Saving Tiamaat • (2007) • shortstory by Gwyneth Jones
24 • Verthandi's Ring • (2007) • shortstory by Ian McDonald
39 • Hatch • [The Great Ship Universe] • (2007) • shortstory by Robert Reed
66 • Winning Peace • (2007) • novelette by Paul J. McAuley
88 • Glory • (2007) • novelette by Greg Egan
112 • Maelstrom • (2007) • novelette by Kage Baker
143 • Blessed by an Angel • (2007) • shortstory by Peter F. Hamilton
158 • Who's Afraid of Wolf 359? • shortstory by Ken MacLeod
170 • The Valley of the Gardens • (2007) • novelette by Tony Daniel
202 • Dividing the Sustain • (2007) • novelette by James Patrick Kelly
234 • Minla's Flowers • [Merlin [4] • 2] • (2007) • novella by Alastair Reynolds
291 • Splinters of Glass • (2007) • novelette by Mary Rosenblum
316 • Remembrance • (2007) • shortstory by Stephen Baxter
334 • The Emperor and the Maula • (2007) • novelette by Robert Silverberg
379 • The Worm Turns • (2007) • shortstory by Gregory Benford
401 • Send Them Flowers • (2007) • novelette by Walter Jon Williams
436 • Art of War • shortstory by Nancy Kress
454 • Muse of Fire • (2007) • novella by Dan Simmons

Genres: Science Fiction, Short Stories, Anthologies, Space Opera, Fiction, Speculative Fiction, Space

608 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 2007

Reviews

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rating System:
5 Excellent
4 Very Good
3 Good
2 Fair
1 Poor
0 Awful

“Saving Tiamaat” by Gwyneth Jones - 2
“Verthandi’s Ring” by Ian McDonald - 2
“Hatch” by Robert Reed - 4
“Winning Peace” by Paul J. McAuley - 3
“Glory” by Greg Egan - 3
“Maelstorm” by Kage Baker - 5
“Blessed by an Angel” by Peter F. Hamilton - 5
“Who’s Afraid of Wolf 359?” by Ken Macleod - 4
“The Valley of the Gardens” by Tony Daniel - 5
“Dividing the Sustain” by James Patrick Kelly - 4
“Minla’s Flowers” by Alastair Reynolds - 5
“Splinters of Glass” by Mary Rosenblum - 5
“Remembrance” by Stephen Baxter - 4
“The Emperor and the Maula” by Robert Silverberg - 4
“The Worm Turns” by Greg Benford - 4
“Send Them Flowers” by Walter Jon Williams - 4
“Art of War” by Nancy Kress - 4
“Muse of Fire” by Dan Simmons - 5

The first two stories, “Saving Tiamaat” and “Verthandi’s Ring”, left me cold. I really didn’t connect with them, though the former ended well. The latter was so far in the future with vast time scales and god like technology that it seemed like I was reading mythology. After going 0 for 2, I was afraid that I might’ve made a mistake in picking up this book.

But the third story, “Hatch” by Robert Reed, got me. The story is the latest in a series of tales which take place on an alien constructed, Jupiter-sized starship circumnavigating the galaxy. Humans, and many other aliens, are just along for the ride.

“Winning Peace” and “Glory” were solid stories. The former dealt with a post-interstellar war treasure hunt while the latter concerned an archaeological dig on an alien world in the midst of a cold war threatening to turn hot.

Things took a turn for the better after that.

“Maelstorm” is about the amusing misadventures of a production company on Mars performing a retro form of entertainment known as “plays.”

There’s nothing amusing about the diabolical exploits of the titular character in “Blessed by an Angel.” It brought the promise of immortality, but the price was one’s soul. And “no” really wasn’t an answer it wanted to hear.

“Who’s Afraid of Wolf 359?” takes the clever play on words and runs with it.

“The Valley of the Gardens”, one of a few stories in which humanity gets its ass handed to it, skillfully pits bio-engineered humans versus an extra-universal lifeform that achieved sentience when the universe only contained subatomic particles.

“Dividing the Sustain” is another amusing tale in which humans re-engineer themselves with strange physical characteristics to avoid becoming stale.

“Minla’s Flowers” shows that no matter how hard you try to save a world from destruction, you inevitably wind up destroying it. Good intentions and roads to brimstone destinations and all that. This was my first Alastair Reynolds story. I'm now on my third book.

“Splinters of Glass” is an excellent tale of intrigue and love beneath the ice on Europa.

“Remembrance” is another Earth’s ass gets brutally kicked story. The problem is, no one remembers it. Well, one guy does.

“The Emperor and the Maula” is a bit gentler in its ass kicking of Earth. Humor salves the wound though. In order to save our world, a woman seeks an audience with the Emperor. But as Earth is considered barbaric, barbarians are to be executed upon setting foot upon the capitol world.

Corporations will always be up to shenanigans. Hostile takeovers for competitors will go on, whether the prize is greater telecom market share or wormholes. In “The Worm Turns” a plucky woman is sent out to traverse a wormhole before someone else can snatch away the rights to it.

“Send Them Flowers” lets us know that the laws of physics may change from one to universe to the next but love triangles are still messy.

History shows us that you can learn a lot about a culture by studying its art. In “Art of War” the same holds true for aliens, but whoever heard of soldiers as artists?

“Muse of Fire” ends the book on a spectacular note. A Shakespearean production company is tasked with performing various works of the Great Bard for humanity’s alien overlords. The performance of the work will determine whether our species lives or dies.

All in all, this is a great collection of stories that will please most sci-fi fans. Hard sci-fi purists are the only group that I don’t see enjoying this anthology. I’ll have to pick up volume two and see what great tales Messrs Dozois and Strahan have gathered for us to read.

[Stefan · Rating 3 out of 5]

"The New Space Opera" is a somewhat deceptively titled but otherwise very good collection of short stories by what the editors refer to as "new space opera" authors. I put "somewhat deceptively" because, in my opinion, most of the stories don't really qualify as space opera. Space opera is a sub-genre of SF, consisting of over-the-top, galaxy-wide adventure stories, often with larger than life heroes, usually containing lots of space ships, dealing with a numbers of planets or galaxies or even universes. It's adventure, romance and violence. Galaxy-wide intrigues. Multiple societies on multiple planets. Aliens, if at all possible, should be included --- ideally many different kinds of them. Also, space opera doesn't pay too much attention to science - as a matter of fact, I'd go as far as saying that it doesn't count as space opera if it doesn't have some form of faster-than-light or hyper-speed or phase space or whatever else the author comes up with that allows ships to shoot from galaxy to galaxy in a few hours or days.
So anyway. The stories in this collection all range from good to excellent. There are really no clunkers in there (although strangely enough, the very first story - by Gwyneth Jones - comes closest). The odd thing is that many of the stories just aren't space opera. One of them is set entirely under the ice on one of Jupiter's moons. While it's a thrilling story, it's really not space opera. Others are confined to a single city. Kage Baker's story, loosely connected to the "Empress of Mars" novella (and I just figured out this is actually connected to her Company series) deals with someone setting up a theater company on a Martian colony. It's great, but it's just not space opera.
Of course, the short story as a format by definition doesn't lend itself to the epic narrative form you'd expect for space opera, but if you're willing to concede that some of these stories offer slices of a larger epic, a snapshot of a longer story, then they could work as space opera. In fact, some of the stories are presented as part of an author's established SF universe. E.g. Peter F. Hamilton's story appears to be set somewhere between "Judas Unchained" and "The Dreaming Void" (and explains some of the new concepts that popped up in the 1500 year gap between those 2 novels). Other stories are part of a series of short stories that tell a larger story.
There are some great stories in this collection. The final story, "Muse of Fire" by Dan Simmons, is simply excellent. "Minla's Flowers" by Alistair Reynolds is also great (and reminded me of "Tuf Voyaging" by George RR Martin). I'd recommend this anthology to anyone who is looking for new authors to try, and to people interested in the genre. However, if you're new to space opera, you're probably better off trying something by Iain M. Banks (who is missing from this collection, unfortunately) or Peter F. Hamilton.

[Cathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Review for GLORY by Greg Egan

An ingot of metallic hydrogen gleamed in the starlight, a narrow cylinder half a meter long with a mass of about a kilogram.
A very abstract beginning. I skimmed past most of that science-tech babble, I confess. I liked the story that followed the info dump.

However...
“There’s more to life than mathematics,” Joan said. “But not much more.”
Math was always one of my best subjects at school, but still... too much! Math Fiction? Mathematical SF?

It was ok, nice idea of a vaguely Star Trekky set-up without the Prime Directive and more cloning and uploading of consciousness. Plus that hard SF thing with the needle that I skimmed... Did I miss the big reveal, aka Brig Crunch? It probably just flew right over my head.

Glory by Greg Egan can be read for free here: https://outofthiseos.typepad.com/blog...

[Terence · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nothing terribly impressive in this collection.

I had already read the two standouts - "Minla's Flowers" (Alastair Reynolds) and "Muse of Fire" (Dan Simmons). Of the remaining, the best is Tony Daniel's "The Valley of the Gardens" and the absolute worst is Robert Silverberg's "The Emperor and the Maula," a retelling of The Arabian Nights.

My dissatisfaction with many of these stories is philosophical more than literary. There's a tendency in the New Space Opera and other hard-SF novels toward a coldness and inhumanity that rubs me the wrong way.

[Peter Tillman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stronger of the two. Go-to review is David's, below: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Standout for me, from memory:
“Who’s Afraid of Wolf 359?” by Ken Macleod. One of his "fast burn" stories, clever & fun. Online at http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/macle...

I should reread it. OK, I did, in 2016, so not just yet. Shorts are good for rereading, because I forget then so fast....

A number of these stories were reprinted in Dozois #25 (2008), and I reviewed them here:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Florin Constantinescu · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the best all sci-fi original anthology I have read.
Somehow it happened that Strahan & Dozois chose a large list of authors which I like and follow, and very strong stories from them: McAuley, Hamilton, Reynolds, Baxter, Silverberg, Simmons.
Remaining stories are above average as well, there are no fillers here.

[Florin Pitea · Rating 5 out of 5]

A superb anthology courtesy of Messrs. Gardner Dozois and Jonathan Strahan. Definitely worth a second reading. Highly recommended. Mr. Dan Simmons's "Muse of Fire" is unforgettable.

[Ron Henry · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good collection.

The term "new space opera" -- like other trendy genre labels of recent decades such as "cyberpunk" and "slipstream" -- seems all too vaguely defined. In this case perhaps it's little more than a marketing tag, or to be more generous, "what the editors think is cool this year." That's a quibble, I suppose, since it still resulted in a nice anthology, even if a number of the stories really didn't fit the editors' own description of "new space opera."

The only two stories I really didn't care for were those by Kage Baker and Robert Silverberg. I tried starting the Baker story twice and bounced off it both times, which surprised me since I always found her Company stories pretty readable. The Silverberg story felt like a work from the 50s where the aliens are just thinly-disguised non-Anglo ethnic stereotypes -- think those Chinese-sounding trade reps in the Star Wars movies for sad comparison. I can't imagine the editors would have considered publishing this if it hadn't been by a sf eminence grise like Silverberg.

On the other hand, I particularly liked Ian McDonald's "Vertandhi's Ring" (which takes place in a vivid post-human far future), Robert Reed's "Hatch" (set in a niche of the Marrow milieu), Paul McAuley's "Winning Peace," Greg Egan's "Glory," James Patrick Kelly's "Dividing the Sustain," Alastair Reynolds' "Minla's Flowers" (though the direction the plot took was fairly inevitable), Gregory Benford's "The Worm Turns" (felt like a first run at a future novel), Nancy Kress' "Art of War" (maybe was a little long for the central idea), and Dan Simmons' "Muse of Fire." The Kelly and Simmons stories were particularly original and vivid; Simmons's novella in particular had a haunting, gothic feel to it that shouldn't surprise anyone who read the Hyperion novels.

[John Devlin · Rating 3 out of 5]

A knock out story by Simmons to end the book. Several others shine quite brightly.

I’ve newly embraced the ole fun of dipping into well wrought sci-fi, trying to determine the whys and wherefore and then sidestepping to the next whether I was enthralled, enticed or a lil bored.

[Jose Moa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Greg Egan is the hardest SF writter of all times and in this short novel is not less,he introduce advanced quantum physics comcepts as quantum Zeno effect and as ever extrapolates the most advanced physics known ,but rigurously and beliavly to astounding limits.

This narration, with a very fitted title , is about the possible evolution of advanced civilizations as Seekers is to say,that once reached material confort is aimed , witout go out its planet, to pure mathematics,music,art,literature and so on,or as Spreaders that search a way to stars and his efforts are aimed to pure and applied physics,applied mathematics,tecnology,engineering,esplotation of resources and conquering space.
In the novel this dicothomy is presented between the ancient civilization of the Niah and the new of Noudah.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read a lot of short fiction in the SF and Fantasy genre, but I rarely read an entire anthology from cover-to-cover. This is one of those where my effort was rewarded; every story is worth checking out.

[Anatoly · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some good, some just ok stories. Some authors are just better at writing short story format than others. Oh, and a great reminder of how ridiculously good Dan Simmons' writing is!

[Heather-Lin · Rating 3 out of 5]

GR Personal Rating System:
★★★★★ 5 Stars ~ LOVED
★★★★☆ 4 Stars ~ ENJOYED
★★★☆☆ 3 Stars ~ LIKED
★★☆☆☆ 2 Stars ~ MEH
★☆☆☆☆ 1 Star ~ NOPE

Anthologies are such a mixed bag. 2.6 Star average.

This 24-hour audiobook collection was a beast to get through. I found a couple of authors I'd like to follow further, and a ton of authors that I'm turned off from. What is it with so many male authors using their stories as a license to write these masturbatory vignettes? It popped up so often enough that it's worth mentioning in relation to the entire compilation.

★★☆☆☆ SAVING TIAMAAT by Gwyneth Jones
The writing made a lot more sense once I switched from audio to text. A big part of that was that the narrator didn't seem to click with the material. Then again, I don't think I did either. It was a neat idea. Space cannibals and reality rewiring assassins should be awesome. But... Meh.


★☆☆☆☆ VERTHANDI’S RING by Ian McDonald
Okay, I like weird, challenging sci-fi: surreal, post-human, virtual reality matrices etc. Anything by Ted Chiang. Stories like The Quantum Thief, Annihilation, This Is How You Lose the Time War are exquisite and satisfying. I suspect the author was attempting to show off how weird they could be.

This one was creative and colorful, but the most exceptional part was The Reveal. Not enough for me.


★★★☆☆ HATCH by Robert Reed
The writing was good, the world was incredibly interesting although difficult to visualize. The humans/post humans/aliens were interesting too. But at the end I don't think I "got" it. Maybe I just needed more than a short story.


★★★☆☆ WINNING PEACE by Paul J. McAuley
I can't find my notes, but obviously I kind of liked it because I gave it 2.5 Stars.


★★★★★ GLORY by Greg Egan
Artifacts left by a previous civilization that survived for millions of years before mysteriously going extinct.. this leads to existential questions about what motivates a culture. There is a contrast between the ideas of The Hunters and The Seekers...

This was fantastic! It begins with a very complex and daring idea, I had to really concentrate to visualize this molecular needle probe that was crafted. My brain quivered a little bit under the weight of the ideas, but it was really cool. I always love a Sci-Fi story involving archaeologists or anthropologists and a good old mysterious artifact. The philosophical contrast between The Hunters and The Seekers motivations were incredibly appealing, and much more palatable than the dystopian galactic psychology of the Three Body Problem. To top it off, the ending was really satisfying too. I definitely want to read more by this author.

★★★★☆ MAELSTORM by Kage Baker
An embarrassingly rich eccentric on Mars wants to bring culture in the form of The Edgar Allan Poe Theater.

This was so lighthearted and fun, the perfect antidote to dark, serious, high stakes Sci-fi. And the narrator was great with all his melodramatic accents and voices.


★★☆☆☆ BLESSED BY AN ANGEL by Peter F. Hamilton
The debate between old fashioned humans and the higher synthetic mechanical organization.. and the lengths they go to to preserve and promote their culture.

This was a fairly straightforward story with a little bit of twist at the end. There were a couple interesting ideas, but there was also an uncomfortably explicit section which was strange and unnecessary. I expected better from this author.


★★☆☆☆ WHO’S AFRAID OF WOLF 359? by Ken Macleod
A narrator with unreliable memories goes to a doomed planet..

A couple really neat ideas, especially their method of travel. But I really must have been missing something, perhaps some cultural references that I'm ignorant of. This was nominated for the Hugo so clearly there is some depth here that missed me.


★★★★☆ THE VALLEY OF THE GARDENS by Tony Daniel
A wall divides a verdant land from a desert wild and corrupted with mad sentient nanotech left over from a previous war... And a love story.

There were so many ideas in this that I loved! The setting, the technology, the history was fantastic. There was one scene that was really off-putting, a sex scene obviously written by a man that crossed over into gross - and didn't even fit with the rest of the story. It kept it from being a five-star for me.


★★★☆☆ DIVIDING THE SUSTAIN by James Patrick Kelly
A courier traveling to a colony planet under false pretenses, decides to become biologically gay in order to become closer to the woman he has fallen madly in love with. And then it gets weirder from there.

A truly bizarre love story. I absolutely adored that the science in this culture had advanced to the point that people could freely alter their genetic code in order to modify their bodies and behaviors. At the same time, that comes up hard against cherished ideas about our essential identity. I was totally disconcerted that the story starts off with a man proclaiming that he decided to become homosexual. I think that could be downright offensive to some people, and it gave me a lot to think about. I got to give the author credit for going bold.


★★★★☆ MINLA’S FLOWERS by Alastair Reynolds
A traveler tries his best to help a doomed planet...

This was really well written, with clear grief and frustration at the inevitability of how people vie for power, even when there are more important things to be done. This story also reminded me of some of the ideas and themes in The Three Body Problem, on a much smaller scale, and with a more effective emotional impact.


SPLINTERS OF GLASS by Mary Rosenblum
★★★★☆ A man on the run with stolen biotech, and the woman who had been looking for him for 10 years.

What a wonderful world of ice and so-called mosses that are quite a lot like mycelium, the planet has a type of sentence. The setting was so vividly pretty it reminded me of my favorite video game landscapes. The relationship was pretty sweet too.


REMEMBRANCE by Stephen Baxter
★★☆☆☆ An invasion of our planet by an alien aquatic life form.

An interesting depiction of colonization and escalation of aggression. In this case, humans fought back against the subjugation by poisoning the water; the aliens fought back by freezing the entire planet hardcore for a year, which led to deep psychological trauma of the population, which led to the aliens doing a memory wipe... Then at the end there was some kind of time-traveling enemy? This was really strange; I listened to it twice and still wasn't clear on that ending.


THE EMPEROR AND THE MAULA by Robert Silverberg
★★☆☆☆ A sci-fi retelling where a criminal is permitted to delay their execution with storytelling cliffhangers... In this version the emperor is an alien and the storyteller is a contemptible human.

This has an aggressive message about conquerors and colonialism. It was pretty straightforward, with a few interesting spots. Overall I didn't really like it and it didn't work for me. It wasn't that I was squicked out about the alien / human romance, it just wasn't imaginative enough. It also kind of trailed off at the end.


THE WORM TURNS by Greg Benford
★☆☆☆☆ Can't give an overview because I DNF'd pretty quick.

Vulgar and annoying - she referred to herself as getting turned on / getting moist at least twice within the first 15 minutes. It was inelegant and unearned. And the rest of the story wasn't interesting enough to continue. In a short story, that was plenty of time to produce interest!


SEND THEM FLOWERS by Walter Jon Williams
★☆☆☆☆ Not worth even a mini synopsis.

This one wasn't interesting either. Less than 2 minutes in and we're already partying and looking for sex. I didn't like the tone or the setting. Sigh. Boring. Not for me.


ART OF WAR by Nancy Kress
★★★★☆ The story revolves around reclaiming stolen human art from an alien civilization. The title was darn clever, the Art Of War!

Clever in light of this alien society that has cycles of aggression, war, and acquisition, followed by a period of contemplation and artistic atonement. And the acquisition of their enemy's art is a critical component of their war strategy...

Our main character has some form of extreme anxiety that causes seizures. He has a fantastic marriage that is beautifully supportive. In contrast, he has an extremely contentious relationship with his mother who considers him a coward. Ended up not liking his interaction with his mom because she was so overwrought and closed-minded as to be unbelievable. Knocked a star off. Still a refreshing story in this collection


MUSE OF FIRE by Dan Simmons
★☆☆☆☆ In this story, space travel has a central intelligence running the operations of the ship, but it's not an AI. It's a person, in stasis, referred to as the Muse...

Cheese krispies! The obsession with women's bodies was so tedious. Continual descriptions of the Muse being naked, young with lots of details. There was all this sex to kick off the story, which I didn't have a problem with, but it wasn't interesting. Why wasn't this better? This story could have come close to three stars if it hadn't had so many annoying sexist tropes - the author just unthinkingly prioritized male thinking, male perspectives, men speaking for the entire crew etc. And the aforementioned male gaze.

What a shame that the penultimate book in this collection was such a disappointment. This is Dan Simmons. I expected so much better from this author! This really read like vintage sci-fi, which I was not expecting to show up in a contemporary collection. And it was utterly forgettable. Despite the text lovingly conveying the color of her nipples. *rolls eyes*

***

GR Personal Rating System:
★★★★★ 5 Stars ~ LOVED
★★★★☆ 4 Stars ~ ENJOYED
★★★☆☆ 3 Stars ~ LIKED
★★☆☆☆ 2 Stars ~ MEH
★☆☆☆☆ 1 Star ~ NOPE

[The Void Reader · Rating 3 out of 5]

The New Space Opera edited by Gardner Dozois & Jonathan Strahan
⭐️⭐️⭐️ (3 out of 5)

Despite its bold promise to redefine the genre, The New Space Opera feels more like a mixed cargo hold than a unified fleet. While the anthology sets out to showcase the grandeur and emotional sweep that defines space opera—“an exuberant celebration of the very large and the very small”—many of the stories here drift far from that orbit.

Some entries deliver the goods: sweeping interstellar settings, high-stakes drama, and the kind of cosmic scale that evokes Star Wars or Battlestar Galactica. But too many veer into quieter, more introspective territory that, while well-written, feels misaligned with the anthology’s stated mission. A few stories weren’t just off-theme—they felt like time sinks, lacking the propulsion or payoff expected from space opera’s pulpy, panoramic tradition.

As a concept, this collection is ambitious: bringing together the voices that shaped the “new space opera” movement alongside emerging talents. But the execution is uneven. For readers seeking the operatic—galactic empires, doomed love across wormholes, sentient starships whispering secrets of the void—this anthology offers only sporadic satisfaction.

Recommended for completists and genre historians. Casual fans may want to scan the table of contents and cherry-pick the stories that actually sing.

Happy reading 🚀🪐📚

[Graff Fuller · Rating 3 out of 5]

01 The New Space Opera (anthology)
Average Rating: 60/18 = 3.33 Stars

My favorite story was by Alastair Reynolds called Minla's Flowers - 4.5 Stars

My least favorite stories were by Gwyneth Jones called Saving Tiamaat AND James Patrick Kelly called Dividing the Sustain. BOTH were rated at 2.5 Stars.

Short stories are using rated lower for me, since I really do not enjoy this medium. I enjoy long form story telling...500 plus pages and long standing series...so that we can live in this world for a LONG time and truly get to know the characters...where they almost become family.

In short stories, you are dropped into a story in the middle and you only get a few scenes. It really is a frustrating experience for me.

The rating will obviously differ with each person. There are not ANY in this anthology that is horrible.

01: Gwyneth Jones: "Saving Tiamaat"
- 2.5 Stars - just wasn't that interested.
02: Ian McDonald: "Verthandi's Ring"
- 3 Stars - a little too loopy for me.
03: Robert Reed: "Hatch"
- 3.5 Stars
04: Paul J. McAuley: "Winning Peace"
- 3 Stars 
05: Greg Egan: "Glory"
- 3.5 Stars 
06: Kage Baker: "Maelstrom"
- 3.5 Stars 
07: Peter F. Hamilton: "Blessed by an Angel"
- 3.5 Stars 
08: Ken MacLeod: "Who's Afraid of Wolf 359?"
- 3.5 Stars 
09: Tony Daniel: "The Valley of the Gardens"
- 3.5 Stars 
10: James Patrick Kelly: "Dividing the Sustain"
- 2.5 Stars 
11: Alastair Reynolds: "Minla's Flowers"
- 4.5 Stars 👆
12: Mary Rosenblum: "Splinters of Glass"
- 3 Stars 
13: Stephen Baxter: "Remembrance"
- 3 Stars 
14: Robert Silverberg: "The Emperor and the Maula"
- 3.5 Stars 
15: Gregory Benford: "The Worm Turns"
- 3 Stars 
16: Walter Jon Williams: "Send Them Flowers"
- 3.5 Stars 
17: Nancy Kress: "Art of War"
- 4 Stars 
18: Dan Simmons: "Muse of Fire"
- 3.5 Stars

[StarMan · Rating 3 out of 5]

VERDICT: Average ~ 3.2 suns (mostly goodthink).
REVIEW: Not all tales within are "space opera," in my opinion. Not a keeper, but good enough to recommend.

BREAKDOWN:

3/18 stories were 2 stars or lower for me. 5/18 rated 4 or more stars:

Saving Tiamaat by Gwyneth Jones - 1.6
Verthandi’s Ring by Ian McDonald - 1.7
Hatch by Robert Reed - 3
Winning Peace” by Paul J. McAuley - 2.8
Glory by Greg Egan - 3.3
Maelstorm by Kage Baker - 2
Blessed by an Angel by Peter F. Hamilton - 4.6
Who’s Afraid of Wolf 359? by Ken Macleod - 2.8
The Valley of the Gardens by Tony Daniel - 4.3
Dividing the Sustain by James Patrick Kelly - 2.9
Minla’s Flowers by Alastair Reynolds - 4.9
Splinters of Glass by Mary Rosenblum - 3.3
Remembrance by Stephen Baxter - 3
The Emperor and the Maula by Robert Silverberg - 4
The Worm Turns by Greg Benford - 2.9
Send Them Flowers by Walter Jon Williams - 3
Art of War by Nancy Kress - 3
Muse of Fire by Dan Simmons - 4

AVERAGE (MEAN) ~3.2 stars

[Katya · Rating 3 out of 5]

The whole thing gets just barely 3 stars out of 5. There were some great stories and some not so great ones; there were also some great narrators and some not so great ones. The following is more quick notes (some including spoilers) than actual reviews of most of the stories, so I'm putting it under a spoiler tag. I have rated each story on its own, and averaged those to get the book rating.

Saving Tiamaat by Gwyneth Jones (read by Carrington MacDuffie)
3.5/5
People will be people, even when those people are aliens, and the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Verthandi's Ring by Ian McDonald (read by Caroline Shaffer)
3/5
Wibbly wobbly timey wimey.

Hatch by Robert Reed (read by Paul Michael Garcia)
3/5
Inscrutable trilobite.

Winning Peace by Paul J. McAuley (read by Tom Weiner)
2/5
It's missing something, but I'm not really sure what. I wasn't really invested in any of the characters, and they were not terribly distinct from each other.

Glory by Greg Egan (read by Cat Gould)
4/5
People will be people, even when they are aliens, and some of them are more like cancer.

Maelstrom by Kage Baker (read by Tom Taylorson)
1/5
The humor is too broad for me, and seems far too self-indulgent and amused by itself. I particularly dislike futuristic stories that drop current pop-culture references like people 200 years from now are going to a) care about them and remember them, and b) have the same context and perception of them that we do now.

Blessed by an Angel by Peter F. Hamilton (read by Paul Michael Garcia)
1/5
Somehow I don't think that the author wanted my reaction to be what it was. I was appropriately horrified at the "angel" and his behavior, but I was equally horrified at Paul et al's behavior.

Who's Afraid of Wolf 359 by Ken MacLeod (read by Tom Weiner)
2/5
Meh. The worst kind of space opera: no characterization. This might have made a nice novel, but as a short story it read more like a synopsis than a story.

The Valley of the Gardens by Tony Daniel (read by Carlos Lopez and Peter Macon)
no rating
The portions of the narration by Carlos Lopez are painfully awkward. I had to stop listening and will probably try to read the story in ebook form instead, because it was interesting.

Dividing the Sustain by James Patrick Kelly (read by Kevin Kenerly)
3/5
Weird, and weirdly entertaining. Not really the surprising twist it was intended as.

Minla's Flowers by Alastair Reynolds (read by Paul Michael Garcia)
4/5
Depressing. Good, but depressing.

Splinters of Glass by Mary Rosenblum (read by Peter Macon)
3/5
I suspect I wasn't paying as much attention to this as I should have been, because it felt like it ought to have made more sense than it did.

Remembrance by Stephen Baxter (read by Pamela Garelick)
2/5
I usually like Stephen Baxter, but this felt like a short piece of a much longer story, especially with the addition of new plot stuff near the very end that wasn't really addressed.

The Emperor and the Maula by Robert Silverberg (read by Carrington MacDuffie)
3/5
Scheherazade in space. The romance angle was kind of weird, and I couldn't connect with the protagonist at all.

The Worm Turns by Gregory Benford (read by Erica Sullivan)
4/5
I really like the banter and the turns of phrase. I've seen the author's name around, but with so many books out there, I hadn't gotten around to reading anything by him yet. Putting him on my list.

Send Them Flowers by Walter Jon Williams (read by Kevin Kenerly)
4/5
Intergalactic con artists. I'm probably giving this a higher rating than it deserves, but I love this type of story.

Art of War by Nancy Kress (read by Tom Taylorson)
4/5
There will always be people who try to understand perspectives outside their own, and there will always be people who can't imagine there is any perspective other than their own.

Muse of Fire by Dan Simmons (read by Tristan Morris)
4/5
Shakespeare in space.

[Yev · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an original anthology. All the stories were published in 2007. As it says, this is THE NEW SPACE OPERA, not the old sort. The old sort being that which was published in the pulp magazines of the 1950s. It's unclear when the NEW began. In 2008, the next year, Jeff VanderMeer would publish The New Weird, and there are probably other NEW X that I'm aware of. I personally consider very little of this to agree with what I feel space opera to be, but that's fine. The editors say at one point that it's "wide-screen, high-bit-rate, action packed qualities typical of the form". I'm not sure what that means, but I don't think it applies to quite a few of the stories here either. Regardless of semantics and commonalities, there's still some enjoyable stories in here.

Saving Tiamaat - Gwyneth Jones [Buonaratti Transit]
The Interstellar Diaspora has discovered a new planet of sentient bipeds and now seeks to civilize them. Their planet has been ravaged by ethnic civil war, as the dominant ethnicity literally cannibalizes everyone else. Thus, The Interstellar Disapora sends representatives who believe that We Can Fix Them.
Meh

Verthandi's Ring - Ian McDonald
Two universal civilizations decide that there can only be one civilization to exist throughout the multiverse. The scale was too immense for me to take seriously. Any sense of wonder I may have had was obliterated by my constant eye rolling. Early on a single ship destroys 80k planets which kills 20 trillion sentients with a single brilliant strategic attack. Maybe some can read that and be utterly amazed, but when I read it I think, "oh, ok, that's a lot, huh."
Meh

Hatch - Robert Reed [The Great Ship Universe]
I've read at least a few of Reed's Great Ship short fiction, but I've never been interested enough to commit to the novels. Their scale is immense and the characters are functionally immortal superbeings, but it's never quite worked for me. In this one a raider seeks fortune by harvesting rare materials from a swarm of billions of insect-like biological robots, or something like that. There's a lot of speculation about the greater series and talk about plans that stretch into the millennia, to say the least.
Ok

Winning Peace - Paul J. McAuley [Jackaroo]
His side, the Alliance, lost the war against the Collective, and as a prisoner of war he's sold into slavery from one slaver to another. The current slaver sends him off on a suicide mission to a brown dwarf to retrieve what may be a elder culture artifact. It's also his chance to escape.
Ok

Glory - Greg Egan
Researchers travel to a relatively undeveloped planet to study the artifacts of an ancient civilization before the contemporary culture destroys everything because they revere only war and expansion.
Enjoyable

Maelstrom - Kage Baker [Mars]
An eccentric man living on Mars becomes extremely wealthy due to the generosity of his patron. He decides to devote his life and wealth to adapting old stories, especially Edgar Allen Poe, into theatrical plays. He assembles a motely crew, including two z-list actors from Earth and hopes for the best. One of those actors insists on doing Spongebob Squarepants impressions in a Poe story. Both popular culture and old classics are mocked. It's a far funnier story than I would have expected and by the end I was chuckling quite a bit.
Enjoyable

Blessed by an Angel - Peter F. Hamilton [Commonwealth Universe]
A pregnant woman is abducted to test whether she's been infected by a cultural parasite. Their foes work their ways by corrupting children. Most of the time is spent arguing about politics. I may not agree, but it was interesting to read about. It was moderately reminiscent of the relationship between Demarchists and Conjoiners in Alastair Reynold's Revelation Space series.
Ok

Who's Afraid of Wolf 359? - Ken Macleod
A man has committed adultery, which is illegal, with a member of the tycoon's harem. He's sentenced to a suicide mission of going to a planet where civilization has collapsed and report back his findings. The story seems to be a set-up for the punchline ending, which made me groan.
Blah

The Valley of the Gardens - Tony Daniel
The farm posts and fencing had stood for 50,000 years, their code preventing the spread of the desert into the pastures. All the soil and everything else was programmed. He was only 1,500 years old, still centuries away from truly being an adult. One day he meets a woman and falls in love, but she was of the desert and he of the pasture. They could neither cross over, but they had width of the fence to express their love. SUDDEN 50K YEARS FLASHBACK TO INTERGALATIC SPACE BATTLES AGAINST AN EXTRADIMENSIONAL LOVECRAFTIAN BEING WHOSE UNLIMTED TENTACLES CAN APPEAR ANYWHERE AT ANY TIME IN THE UNIVERSE. Return to the present and conclusion.
Ok

Dividing the Sustain - James Patrick Kelly
This story literally seems like it's almost all talking in a few different rooms, except for the sex, which I found nice in its own way. A courier has deceived his way onto a vessel filled with Consensualist heading to their homeworld. They don't make any decisions unless a consensus is reached. The courier feels like he's going to die if he has to stay with his pod so he schemes to leave them and and live with the pregnant ex-wife of the captain, with whom he's infatuated. I enjoyed the strange transgressive twist.
Enjoyable

Minla's Flowers - Alastair Reynolds [Merlin]
A reluctant uplift/savior story where a planet's people must use science to escape from an upcoming calamity that will doom their planet. Knowledge without wisdom, let alone empathy, may create monsters.
Enjoyable

Splinters of Glass - Mary Rosenblum
A man leaves his lover's house and sees his ex-lover who believes that he's been dead for ten years. Memories rush back. There's a lot of motorized snowboarding scenes, including fight scenes, which were rather neat. It takes places on Europa, which is now livable, but still entirely ice. There's silly backstory stuff and I'm conflicted about it ended, but overall I enjoyed it.
Enjoyable

Rememberance - Stephen Baxter [Xelee]
Only one person, The Rememberer, still remembers the true past regarding the Squeem invasion and the atrocity they committed upon the Earth, but he slips up and is arrested. And so, he begins the tale that has been passed down for centuries.
Ok

The Emperor and the Maula - Robert Silverberg
This basis for this story's structure seems to be 1,001 Nights. A woman meets the emperor of the alien species who has conquered Earth and tells him stories and although she's meant to be executed, it keeps being delayed day after day, because the emperor must hear another story from her. It's fine, but I was never engaged with it.
Meh

The Worm Turns - Gregory Benford [Worm]
A woman is deeply in debt, but she's offered a suicide mission to clear all of it, which involves a wormhole. I didn't think the humor went well, especially the sex humor, and I thought it was an awkward story with a style that I disliked. I've read over a dozen short fiction stories from Benford, some of which I've quite enjoyed, and as far as I can remember this is the one I've liked the least by far. Disappointing.
Blah

Send Them Flowers - Walter Jon Williams
Two space drifters, one a relatively average guy, and the other an improbably successful seducer of women are on the run due to the latter's cuckoldry and theft. They travel through the multiverses until they run out of food and have to dock. They have a choice of spending their remaining money on food or partying. They choose the latter, getting drunk, high, and whoring. The average guy thinks he needs to turn his life around, but change is hard.
Enjoyable

Art of War - Nancy Kress
A captain is tasked with assessing and recovering the art looted by the Tali, with whom they are at war. There's one terrible problem though, the general is his mother, and they have a terrible relationship. So terrible that when he stresses out about her he goes hysterical, seizes, and passes out. More than anything else this story is about his relationship with her. The ending is atrocious and petty. I don't know why Kress wrote this story, let alone why it was accepted, but it's awful, annoying, and fixated. As with the Benford story, I've read more than a dozen stories from her, but this surely has to be the worst.
Blah

Muse of Fire - Dan Simmons
A spacefaring troupe of Shakespearean performers have to put upon plays for ever increasingly powerful beings, which have enslaved humanity, until at least they play for the one who may be the the most powerful of all. It's infused from start to finish with Shakespeare. There's some sexism, racism, and sex scenes, one with a girl who was "very young but old enough for me not to feel too guilty" which is stated to be the usual for the twenty year protagonist. I couldn't go along with the silliness this time.
Meh

[Chris Perrin · Rating 2 out of 5]

So far, this book isn't thrilling me. The stories are okay, but the book feels like it's thumbing its nose at what I always thought space opera was: from Star Wars to the Honor Harrington.

Basically, the New Space Opera would feel like the Old Hard Science Fiction if not for the foreward which basically says that the familiar tropes of current science fiction (hence everything in the collection): huge ships, FTL, etc. are impossible and cannot happen.

Leave it to science fiction to take all the fun out of the future.

The other problem I have about this volume is that several of the stories try to outdo themselves with techy jargon which detracts from the overall storytelling. After reading the first story, I don't know what numinal intelligence is and because the rest of the story was so lame, I haven't cared to look it up. Somehow I think it means being able to create things with your mind, but the story didn't deign to describe any of the mechanics of how the world worked. Which was a poor choice since somehow there was time travel in a fake world that kind of sort of didn't exist.

In sum, right now the book is lost somewhere in my car and I'm not trying too hard to find it.

I'd stay away if I were you.

--------------

I made myself finish it and it got better. It made me think about science fiction different. I still feel like there was some snobbery against space opera in it.

[Tracy B · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rating for each story:

***** Saving Tiamaat • (2007) • shortstory by Gwyneth Jones
***** Verthandi's Ring • (2007) • shortstory by Ian McDonald
***** Hatch • [The Great Ship Universe] • (2007) • shortstory by Robert Reed
*** Winning Peace • (2007) • novelette by Paul J. McAuley
*** Glory • (2007) • novelette by Greg Egan
** Maelstrom • (2007) • novelette by Kage Baker
***** Blessed by an Angel • (2007) • shortstory by Peter F. Hamilton
*** Who's Afraid of Wolf 359? • shortstory by Ken MacLeod
**** * The Valley of the Gardens • (2007) • novelette by Tony Daniel
*** Dividing the Sustain • (2007) • novelette by James Patrick Kelly
**** Minla's Flowers • [Merlin [4] • 2] • (2007) • novella by Alastair Reynolds

FAVORITE STORY: ***** Splinters of Glass • (2007) • novelette by Mary Rosenblum

***** Remembrance • (2007) • shortstory by Stephen Baxter
*** The Emperor and the Maula • (2007) • novelette by Robert Silverberg
**** The Worm Turns • (2007) • shortstory by Gregory Benford
***** Send Them Flowers • (2007) • novelette by Walter Jon Williams
***** Art of War • shortstory by Nancy Kress
**** Muse of Fire • (2007) • novella by Dan Simmons

[Dynagrip · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some decent stories in here but because it's an anthology there are some terrible ones as well. Dan Simmons finished it up with a relatively strong entry, Muse of Fire. Gregory Benford's The Worm Turns was uh, not so good.

I skipped Mary Rosenbaum's story because it was clearly going to be utterly offal (see what I did there?). For some reason there are very few female genre writers that can write male characters at all. To be fair there are many genre writers (of any gender) that don't write well at all.

The worst writing of all goes to Paul J. McAuley's Winning Peace. Holy shit was it bad. I don't have the book in front of me, otherwise I would share my favorite passage.

Greg Egan had a really good story in here, Glory, which somehow I can't recall the details at the moment. I know it was good enough that I'm now considering checking out his more recent stuff.

Robert Silverberg committed a cardinal sin for genre fiction in my book, taking an old old story, in this case Night of a Thousand Tales, and making it science-fictiony. It's just so damn lazy.

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm old enough to have read the "old" space opera. I'm not sure that all of these stories would qualify as what I always thought of space opera, but it is still an enjoyable collection. Some of the "new" might be new means of travel across space in some of the stories - means that even SF authors of 70 years ago had not dreamed up. But as is so often the case, it isn't the tech that makes some of these stories special, but the people. Having just finished Monuments Men about the4 effort to salvage European artworks in WWII, I especially enjoyed Dan Simmons' story about efforts to rescue human artworks in an interstellar war. The caves in which the art was stored sounded very familiar.

[Blair · Rating 2 out of 5]

Half space opera, half boring.

I had high hopes for this anthology of supposedly space opera stories, however, the vast majority of them focus on simple interstellar or planetary stories where the approach does not follow the same precepts you would expect from a space opera story. We have metaphysical stories, romantic stories, and a few adventures focused on scientific themes. A couple of the stories are space opera, and even then I wasn't satisfied.

Too bad, but this thick tome just bored me.

[Denise · Rating 3 out of 5]

Evidently the New space opera is not much to my taste, since it seemingly involves a lot more space than opera these days (notwithstanding the last story, by Dan Simmons, which is about half Shakespeare.) Galactic empires are only fun if you have Han and Luke, R2 and Chewy, an Ewok or two - heroes, that is, with something to fight for. Otherwise it's all Rosencrantz and Guildenstern waiting for Godot, pointless and not even tragic.

But I loved the Kage Baker story.

[Tom Rowe · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are good stories here, and there are great stories here.

My favorites:
The Muse of Fire by Dan Simmons - A Shakespearean acting troupe travels the galaxy.
Minla's Flowers by Alastair Reynolds - A man tries to save a planet, but they don't listen.
Remembrance by Stephen Baxter - Are there some things better left forgotten?
The Emperor and the Maula by Robert Silverberg - 1001 Nights in space.
Art of War by Nancy Kress - Someone has mommy issues.

I would listen to these again.

[Austin Beeman · Rating 4 out of 5]

THE NEW SPACE OPERA IS RATED 81%
18 STORIES : 2 GREAT / 9 GOOD / 7 AVERAGE / 0 POOR / 0 DNF

I was halfway through this anthology before I realized that it was an original anthology. Before that I’d assume that it was a themed anthology of modern Space Opera similar to The 2020 Look at Space Opera Book, edited by Allan Kaster (85% Positive.)

Gardner Dozois and Jonathan Strahan have certainly assembled a list of excellent writers, even if the stories in this collection are not their best work. The tales are full of wild galaxy-expanding baroque speculation and it is sometimes hard to find anything firm to ground yourself. Adventure abounds, as if the authors really wanted to make this into blockbuster movies.

At 81% Positive, with no Poor or DNF stories, it is worth reading. Two stories really stood out:

“Minla's Flowers” • (2007) • novella by Alastair Reynolds. An adventurer and his AI spaceship land on a planet at war, but needs to come together to evacuate. He befriends a young girl who’s life will be of great importance to the mission. In an out of cryogenic sleep, the protagonist sees the rapid transformation of the society as they try to get unified and able to escape. This is brilliant in its execution of its concept and full of power human characters. A superb novella.

“Muse of Fire” • (2007) • novella by Dan Simmons

A troupe of intergalactic Shakespearean actors performs for alien races that are progressively more awe-inspiring and strange. They may be performing for humanity’s very survival. This is a story that slowly expands from small conversations to the most majestic possible scale, while never losing the humanity of its characters. I loved this.

***

THE NEW SPACE OPERA IS RATED 81%
18 STORIES : 2 GREAT / 9 GOOD / 7 AVERAGE / 0 POOR / 0 DNF

Saving Tiamaat • short story by Gwyneth Jones

Good. A diplomat’s biases get in the way of negotiations between two factions on a primitive planet.

Verthandi's Ring • short story by Ian McDonald

Good. Wildly inventive story of war across galaxies with trillions dead and characters that basically live forever. Complicated to follow and maybe not entirely worth it.

Hatch • (2007) • short story by Robert Reed

Average. A dense baroque tale of people that live on the outside of a Jupiter-sized Great Ship.

Winning Peace • (2007) • novelette by Paul J. McAuley

Good. A fun adventure yarn about an indentured pilot and his owner/boss in a post-war world involving an artifact from a ancient culture.

Glory • (2007) novelette by Greg Egan

Good. Provincial squabbles get in the way of exploration of an ancient civilization’s mathematic remnants.

Maelstrom • (2007) • novelette by Kage Baker

Average. A quirk comedic story of a man who puts on a theater performance on Poe’s “Descent into the Maelstrom” for a rough planet.

Blessed by an Angel • (2007) • short story by Peter F. Hamilton

Average. Higher beings infiltrate a world and attempt to infiltrate it by seducing a couple. Over complex backstory for a very slight story.

Who's Afraid of Wolf 359? • (2007) short story by Ken MacLeod

Average. Man offends the Tychoon on a space station and is sent to investigate the problems on Wolf 359.

The Valley of the Gardens • (2007) • novelette by Tony Daniel

Good. Two parallel love stories combine with a brutal war fought against a collective consciousness. Good characters and great prose, but a ending that just keeps it out of greatness.

Dividing the Sustain • (2007) novelette by James Patrick Kelly

Average. On a large colony ship, individuals must ‘recast’ themselves to keep happy and sane. One man decides to recast as gay and finds himself drawn into intrigue around the Captain and his wife.

Minla's Flowers • (2007) • novella by Alastair Reynolds

Great. An adventurer and his AI spaceship land on a planet at war, but needs to come together to evacuate. He befriends a young girl who’s life will be of great importance to the mission. In an out of cryogenic sleep, the protagonist sees the rapid transformation of the society as they try to get unified and able to escape.

Splinters of Glass • (2007) novelette by Mary Rosenblum

Good. On the wild icy frontier of Europa, a man is hiding out from a large corporation. Then a former lover comes looking for them and they have to run.

Remembrance • (2007) • short story by Stephen Baxter

Good. A rememberer recounts the history of earth’s conquering and subjugation by an aquatic race.

The Emperor and the Maula • (2007) novelette by Robert Silverberg

Average. A Sci-Fi reworking of the story of Scheherazade.

The Worm Turns • (2007) • short story by Gregory Benford

Good. Wild adventure inside a wormhole with aliens. Dense science talk.

Send Them Flowers • (2007) • novelette by Walter Jon Williams

Good. A fun romp as a trader and a womanizer try to stay just ahead of the people they’ve cheated and husbands who’s wives they’ve seduced.

Art of War • (2007) short story by Nancy Kress

Good. A military art historian with seizures and painful family issues is sent to catalogue the human art stolen by an alien race in a war.

Muse of Fire • (2007) • novella by Dan Simmons

Great. A troupe of intergalactic Shakespearean actors performs for alien races that are progressively more awe-inspiring and strange. They may be performing for humanity’s very survival.

[David Lum · Rating 2 out of 5]

DNF at 66%

Some of the stories were ok, but most weren’t enjoyable for me. A bit odd since I thought I was a fan of short stories, and I felt ready for some more sci-fi.

Part of the problem is that I never like whatever sweaty ideas come out of Peter Hamilton, I dislike Stephen Baxter, and I’ve never been interested in poor old Robert Silverberg. I probably shouldn’t have picked up this collection, but it made some best-of list and here we are.

[Guy · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent collection of SF short stories. Not all of them are space opera in the classic sense of the term, but since they are all good that will trouble only the pedants among us. If you are looking for new authors to read (or more from authors you already know you like), this is a good resource.

[Blake Kanewischer · Rating 2 out of 5]

I love space opera as a genre, and the vast majority of these didn't quite sit with me. Rereading the table of contents, I can't confidently identify which stories I liked, which doesn't bode well for a collection of short stories.

[Vladimir Vázquez · Rating 5 out of 5]

A través de este libro me he dado cuenta que mi subgénero favorito sigue vigente y vibrante, pero también he notado algo curioso, el ciberpunk, y la hard scifi, se han fundido con la Space Opera, quiero decir, en estas historias, los autores asumen que el lector ya entiende lo que es un mundo virtual, asumen que el lector ya comprende lo que son nanites (al punto de darles otro nombre y ni siquiera detenerse a explicarlos) y entonces utilizan esos elementos en los argumentos clásicos del viaje interestelar, la guerra a escala galáctica y la civilización Imperial antigua e inmensa...

El primer relato Saving Tiamaat de Gwyneth Jones es una curiosa historia de diplomacia interestelar que resume muy bien lo que les comentaba más arriba; en esta historia la autora utiliza mundos virtuales, seudo máquinas del tiempo, poderes psíquicos, etc. y de paso agrega los elementos clásicos de la Space Opera, civilizaciones alienígenas, federaciones interestelares, etc.

Por supuesto es un relato asombroso, pero difícil. Me parece muy interesante de parte de los editores utilizar este relato para comenzar, es como una sacudida, por lo menos lo fue para mi, me sorprendió darme cuenta en lo que se ha convertido la Space Opera hoy en día. Y la autora hace un gran trabajo fusionando todos esos elementos; por otro lado también es apabullante, no me imagino cómo se sentiría alguien que esté comenzando a leer ciencia ficción con un relato como este, hay tantos conceptos aquí, que alguien que no esté acostumbrado simplemente pensara que la historia no tiene ni pies ni cabeza; para que la escritora se anime a narrar una historia tan compleja quiere decir que tiene una confianza enorme en la inteligencia de sus lectores, cosa que habla muy bien de estos.

Lo curioso es que no es la única historia con estas características.

Vertandi´s Ring de Ian McDonald es una historia ligeramente más tradicional aunque no por ello menos desafiante para el lector, el autor nos cuenta una historia clásica de guerra intergaláctica, pero entonces toma cosas como por ejemplo las esferas de Dyson, los ascensores orbitales, y la física contemporánea y lo mezcla todo para crear una gran historia, sin embargo recordemos que años atrás, los conceptos de esferas de Dyson o ascensores orbitales daban para escribir novelas completas, pero parece que hoy en día el lector de ciencia ficción está tan acostumbrado a estos conceptos que el autor se puede dar el lujo de ponerlos todos juntos en un relato. Es decir que las ideas que hace unos años nos asombraban y nos dejaban maravillados, son utilizados ahora como moneda común.

The Hatch por Robert Reed Es una historia que está contenida dentro de un universo literario más amplio, los protagonistas viajan en una nave espacial del tamaño de Júpiter, sin embargo gracias a la introducción de los editores y las buenas artes del escritor uno no necesita conocer todo el background de la historia para entenderla, pero imagino que se disfrutaría más. En la historia, el autor narra como tras una guerra en el interior de la nave algunos supervivientes consiguen formar una sociedad en el exterior de la misma, nuevamente nos encontramos con un argumento clásico, pero aumentado y detallado a niveles que no habíamos visto antes. Por ejemplo los habitantes de esta ciudad, son inmortales y no se preocupan mucho de sus salud, al menos en este caso el autor se detiene a explicar como y por que de esto aunque brevemente. Pero también lanza casi sin darse cuenta otro montón de conceptos como motores de fusión, bioquímica, mecánica del caos, IA, etc. Sin detenerse a explicar nada.
La historia es entretenida, aunque deja al lector como suspendido en el aire al final; pero ciertamente la historia no es recomendable para aquellos lectores que no tengan una enorme experiencia con la CF detrás de ellos.

Winning Peace por Paul J. McAuley es de las pocas historias que podría ser entendidas por un novato, aunque el autor usa algunos conceptos dificiles, no es nada que no pueda entender una persona que se siente a ver el Discovery channel regularmente (como se nota que esta reseña es vieja). La historia narra de un futuro en donde la humanidad se ha dividido entre esclavistas y no esclavistas y las dificultades de un esclavo que intenta escapar de su situación, el autor cuenta la historia de forma interesante y con bastante acción.

Glory de Greg Egan quien es un reconocido autor cuyo estilo conocemos muy bien; Egan como los autores de antes de la vieja Space Opera si se detiene a tomar al lector de la mano y detallar las ideas, la historia inicia con una larga perorata sobre materia, antimateria y relativismo, pero por lo menos el autor se detiene a explicarla, luego utiliza nuevos conceptos como nanomáquinas y nanoconstrucción, que son difíciles para un novato, pero también se detiene a explicarlos. Luego la historia va revelando los temas tradicionales de Egan, la conciencia, el honor, la búsqueda del conocimiento, etc.

Maelstrom por Kage Baker es una de dos curiosas historias sobre el Teatro, algo tan tradicional y tan humano como el teatro ¿que cabida tiene en una recopilación de relatos sobre la nueva Space Opera? ah pues que lo hacen en Marte. Es decir que la autora nos narra no de la exploración de Marte, ni de la terraformación del planeta, no, eso es historia vieja que ha sido narrado por miles de autores antes, la escritora en cambio elige narrarnos las dificultades de la primera compañía de teatro marciana y sus dificultades para poner ante el público su primera obra, nada más y nada menos que "A Descent in to the Maelstrom" por Edgar Alan Poe (me acordé de crónicas marcianas), genial, simplemente genial y es una demostración de lo mucho que ha cambiado el subgénero.

Blessed by an Angel de Peter F. Hamilton no tiene ninguna relación con la conocida serie de televisión; es sin embargo otra de esas historias de las que les hablé antes en donde el autor combina los elementos clásicos y conocidos de la Space Opera y los mezcla (muy eficientemente) con otros elementos como por ejemplo cibernética, genética, mundos virtuales, nanotecnologías, etc. Sin embargo el autor no lanza todo aquello sobre el lector de una vez, por el contrario se toma su tiempo para explicar, pero teniendo tantos conceptos juntos me parece que tampoco sería una historia amistosa con el lector novato. Por la misma naturaleza de la historia creo que les dañaría la sorpresa si les cuento mucho del argumento, digamos simplemente que es fascinante.

Who's Afraido of Wolf 359? de Ken MacLeod, es una muy buena historia que narra un muy curioso experimento social que nuestro protagonista altera radicalmente. Al igual que en muchas de las historias del libro, el autor asume que el lector conoce cómo funciona la nanotecnología y el 3D Printing excelente historia para los veteranos de la CF aunque difícil para los recién llegados.

The Valley of the Gardens por Tony Daniel es una historia que siempre recordaré con cariño, me recordó al estilo de Sturgeon no sé por que, es narrada en dos tiempos.
En primer lugar un tiempo en donde el planeta es un hermoso jardín de imposibles habilidades y también un pasado en donde ese mismo planeta se libra una terrible batalla por el futuro de la humanidad. Bellamente contada la historia no es fácil, sin embargo pienso que es posible leerla y disfrutarla sin un enorme background en CF.

Dividing the Sustain de James Patrick Kelley, si les digo que es una historia un tanto detectivesca que implica un divorcio y una pelea sobre los bienes de fortuna de la familia, podría parecer que la historia es bastante corriente, pero que tal si metemos en la ecuación, la inmortalidad, un viaje a velocidades relativistas, la clonación y la alteración de la conciencia? curiosamente el autor consigue que todo esto resulte hasta gracioso, pero muy real, por que efectivamente los humanos terminamos siendo hasta ridículos en los usos que le damos a nuestras tecnologías.

Minla's Flowers de Alastair Reynolds, resultó ser lamentablemente la historia que me gustó menos; puedo decir que incluso odié a uno de los personajes, la historia está bien escrita, no me mal interpreten, y es muy interesante, posee una escala de dimensiones épicas. Sin embargo es en los personajes y en sus reacciones en donde falla la historia.
Me parece haber leído en alguna parte o quizá es tan solo idea mía, que cuando se trata de un historia corta, uno debe utilizar personajes fuertes, personajes de carácter, decididos, con un propósito, o, pienso yo, por lo menos personajes muy arquetípicos, de lo contrario el lector no será capaz de comprender en tan pocas páginas la complejidad de la mente del personaje.
Ese debe ser el problema aquí, el autor en esta ocasión se decide por un personaje indeciso ambivalente quien retrasa por décadas su búsqueda que podría salvar no a la humanidad si no la civilización galáctica para salvar a la gente de un planeta, no solo eso si no que entonces decide hacerlo de la peor manera posible y todo en medio de la peor indecisión que haya visto.

Splinters of Glass por Mary Rosenblum, me recordó mucho ha aquellas viejas historias de Asimov en donde el Buen Doctor se empeñaba en describir las civilizaciones extraterrestres que podrían habitar el sistema solar, en aquella época nuestro conocimiento de nuestro propio sistema solar era escaso, sin embargo Asimov se las ingeniaba para inventarse sugerentes formas de vida adaptadas a las extrañas condiciones de los planetas, igualmente en esta historia la Rosenblum nos describe el futuro de Europa, no el viejo continente si no la luna de Jupiter, allí la autora nos narra, de como los humanos han traído su ciencia y su civilización y explotan los ricos recursos biológicos del satélite, mezclando a la vez una interesante historia llena de acción y romance.

Remembrance de Stephen Baxter, se incluye cerca del principio de la serie de Xeelee sobre la que el autor ha escrito con frecuencia. En esta historia de esclavitud y de liberación, de actos terribles y dolorosos, de recuerdos y de olvidos, la historia lo deja pensando a uno si las acciones de los protagonistas son las correctas o no, pienso que tal vez se haga necesario conocer la serie mejor para llegar a una decisión.

The Emperor and the Maula por Robert Silverberg, Me sorprendí bastante de encontrar a este Señor de la ciencia ficción en este volumen pues no pensé que siguiera escribiendo, con sus clásicos personajes fuertes y voluntariosos, este maestro de la ciencia ficción no nos falla en esta ocasión, tomemos por ejemplo:

"Meanwhile here I am- Earthborn woman, a mere barbaric maula, geting deeper into Imperial Space with each passing light second. I should be trembling with fear, I suppouse.
No. Let the Emperor tremble. Laylah is here!"

La historia es una maravillosa modernización del mito de Sherezade.

The Worm Turns de Gregory Benford, otra interesante historia de este grande de la Ciencia Ficción, el autor nos narra la historia del casi accidental primer viaje interestelar de la humanidad de forma muy interesante, en esta ocasión el autor nos ahorra los clásicos conflictos familiares que plagan sus historias y se decide por un personaje femenino que disfruta su sexualidad muy sanamente (cuando puede).

Send Them Flowers por Walter Jon Williams, es una fantástica historia de un capitán y su amigo, un don Juan, quienes viajan por el multiverso metiendose en miles de problemas como por ejemplo enamorar a las hermosas herederas (unas preciosas ancianas de más de 200 años) de casas comerciales que controlan diferentes universos gracias a su perfecta genética.
Nuevamente una historia excelente para el aficionado pero mortal para el profano.

Art of War de Nancy Kress es una historia muy femenina, aunque curiosamente el protagonista es masculino, sin embargo la fuerza de la historia esta puesta en los sentimientos, en la confianza, en el amor, en la criatura humana con sus debilidades y fortalezas. Y aunque la autora hace abundante uso de los elementos de la Ciencia Ficción y de la Space Opera, el peso de la historia no está allí si no en el carácter de los personajes.

Muse of Fire de Dan Simmons, evidentemente Simmons es uno de los grandes de la Space Opera actual pero, evidentemente también, no es mi estilo y esta historia es la prueba. Si fue escrita antes de Hyperión, entonces evidentemente es una suerte de resumen, de preludio de los temas que veríamos desarrollados con mucho más detalle posteriormente en Hyerión, si fue escrito después entonces tendré que decir que es bastante monotemático, la historia narra las aventuras de otra compañía de teatro (con tal que no se convierta en otro subgénero) que viaja a través de las estrellas interpretando las obras de Shakespeare, y quienes súbitamente descubren que su arte es mucho más importante de lo que ellos pensaban, solo puedo decir que, me acordé tanto de John Lennon y los Beatles...
Será que la ficción de Simmons es así y el universo gira en torno a los sentimientos y acciones humanas, a mi simplemente no me cabe en la cabeza, será muy literario y será muy artístico y todo lo que quieran, pero no es mi estilo, no es lo que estoy buscando cuando me siento a leer una Space Opera.

Un detalle que me parece importante destacar es que a través de todo el conjunto de historias uno se da cuenta que los autores exponen diferentes puntos de vista, pero en su mayoría son positivos, por ejemplo encontré varias historias en donde los humanos se habían unido felizmente a una federación interestelar, o visitaban pacíficamente a otras especies, etc.
Pienso que esa visión positiva del futuro es clásica de la Space Opera y se ve que estos autores también lo sienten así.

Para finalizar debo decir que el libro es una joya, los cuentos, la elección de los autores, y hasta el orden en que los pusieron en el libro es toda una obra de arte que merece ser leída.
Como dije muchas veces, es un libro maravilloso para el conocedor, el fanático de la ciencia ficción y aún más el aficionado de la Space Opera se sentirá maravillado y feliz, sin embargo para alguien que está comenzando en el género sería mejor un Asimov o un Vance.

Vía: La Cueva del Lobo