Professional philosopher Dr. Eve Keneinan recently tweeted her review of Forbidden Thoughts from Superversive Press.
Here are some selected highlights.
Eve dispenses gracious praise and fair criticism. What more could a prospective reader ask for?
On a personal note, it was a total blast and a career highlight to work alongside all of my fellow Forbidden Thoughts collaborators. Readers will find a wealth of excellent stories inside, but I second Eve’s assessment that John C. Wright’s offering stands above the rest. He’s on another level.
In defense of the editors, they purposefully arranged the stories in the order they appear for ease of reading. In retrospect, a premiere star-studded anthology may not have been the best place to experiment with story order. Hindsight’s 20/20.
Of course, I too heartily recommend Forbidden Thoughts. John and Jagi’s stories alone are worth the price of admission. Fans of Niemeierian fiction also get a coveted look at some of the back story for my award-winning Soul Cycle.
If you’re a regular reader of this blog, and you haven’t read Forbidden Thoughts, you’re strongly encouraged to amend that oversight now.
I picked up FT almost as an afterthought and read it during a Guard exercise. I expected fun but goofy politicized stories full of inside jokes but bordering on message fiction. I couldn't have been more wrong.
I agree, Mr. Wright's story was worth the price of admission. I was less enthralled by Mrs. Wright, but now I'm wondering what I missed. Yours was excellent and it was fun being back in the Soul Cycle universe. Overall, I was deeply impressed and have recommended it to a few SF fans in my life.
I am the editor of the anthology God, Robot. Both Mr. and Mrs. Wright have stories in it. I asked Mrs. Wright out of courtesy, since I had asked Mr. Wright. I'd read one thing by her previously and didn't care for it.
Then I read Mrs. Wright's story for "God, Robot" "Ring of Sounding Brass".
I was and am absolutely amazed by it. It is an incredible and moving story. Needless to say, it made it into the anthology, as the finale story, no less.
Give her another shot.
Thank you for your readership and your service.
I loved God, Robot! Excellent anthology, and while I don't remember her story by title, I know she's got excellent chops as a writer. Again, wrt her FT story, I'm pretty sure the fault is mine: prophecy etc is a subject that his closer to home for personal reasons, and any story with it as linchpin would make me twitchy until very recently. It was enjoyable, just uncomfortable because of my own circumstances.
Quick question: was any of the idea for the anthology from Anthony Boucher's "The Quest for St Aquin?"
God, Robot? No, the entire idea came from an offhand comment by John C. Wright on his blog, where he said that if he was going to design robots with laws, he would use the two greatest commandments, love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. He also said he's leave the idea open for future writers.
I loved the idea and am a fan of Asimov's "I, Robot", so I came up with a similar idea of an anthology about the robots interspersed with a frame story, this time about a detective interviewing a felon on the run for decades and now hiding in a monastery.
I'm afraid this is the first I've heard of "The Quest for St. Aquin".
Glad you enjoyed "God, Robot" btw!
Congrats! That's a great review.
Thank you
The only reason I can't buy it now is that I bought it when it first came out.