Category: Reading

Analog Science Fiction & Fact, May/June 2025

Here are my brief summaries and ratings for the latest issue of Analog Science Fiction & Fact magazine.

“Isolate” by Tom R. Pike — A monk with training in linguistics comes to a newly colonized planet to evaluate their language. I really loved how this story treats language and language learning. (My rating: 5/5)

“The Robot and the Winding Wood” by Brenda Cooper — An elderly couple maintaining a campground by themselves with no visitors for years is visited by a robot. A sweet story about the end of the world. (My rating: 5/5)

“Outside the Robles Line” by Raymund Eich — A young man makes a proposal to an older board of the Wise on an asteroid. This one felt like a non-fiction piece forced into a fiction wrapper. (My rating: 3/3)

“Retail Is Dying” by David Lee Zweifler and Ronan Zweifler — An old man wandering an old empty mall encounters a man with a dog he needs to adopt out. Perfect for dog lovers. (My rating: 4/5)

“Groundling” by Shane Tourtellotte — A mechanical engineer born on a generation ship enjoys a tour of duty planetside so much that he angles to be assigned to a new longer tour. This was one of those stories that I wanted to keep going so I could see what happens next. (My rating: 5/5)

“Amtech Deep Sea Institute Thanks You for Your Donation” by Kelsey Hutton — Scientists record the consciousness of a deep sea squid in its natural environment. An interesting piece of flash fiction. (My rating: 4/5)

“North American Union v. Exergy-Petroline Corporation” by TIffany Fritz — A legal finding from a future Supreme Court. The author uses a clever storytelling method, but it got in the way. Legal decisions are not entertaining stories. (My rating: 2/5)

“Momentum Exchange” by Nikolai Lofving Hersfeldt — Two immortals struggle against one another, one trying to keep the other on the planet. This one was good but didn’t really grab me. (My rating: 3/5)

“And So Greenpeace Invented the Death Ray…” by C. Stuart Hardwick — Satellites designed to beam energy to earth are compromised. This one had a thriller vibe. (My rating: 4/5)

“Mnemonomie” by Mark N. Tiedemann — A man wakes up feeling different after almost being beaten to death. A fascinating story of memory and coming-of-age. (My rating:4/5)

“Methods of Remediation in Nearshore Ecologies” by Joanne Rixon — A scientist kayaks the bay testing chemical levels in the soil. Interesting, but not much happens. (My rating: 3/5)

“First Contact, Already Seen” by Howard V. Hendrix — A series of vignettes outlining willful “othering” and personally enthrowning one’s own people. (My rating: 3/5)

“The New Shape of Care” by Lynne Sargent — A woman in hospice care run by robots is held by her daughter in her dying moments. An unexpected and slightly disturbing ending. (My rating: 5/5)

“The Scientist’s Book of the Dead” by Gregor Hartmann — After a revolution by scientists and a war that lowered the human population, those scientists debate lowering population even further. An interesting look at a society run by scientists. (My rating: 5/5)

“Siegried Howls Against the Void” by Erik Johnson — Siegfried, a slow, lumbering spacecraft communicates with Eurydice across the void of space. A metaphor for human relationships and aging. (My rating: 3/5)

“The Iceberg” by Michael Capobianco — A found-footage story of a man surviving on an iceberg near Antarctica after some sort of cataclysm. Meh. (My rating: 3/5)

“Bluebeard’s Womb” by M.G. Wills — A scientist experiments with men having babies as a way to address misogyny. Unexpected things happen in this well-told novella. (My rating: 4/5)

Average rating for a story in this issue: 3.82/5

Meditations by Marcus Aurelius translated by Gregory Hays

Over the years, I have heard about this book many times. Most recently it was from Ryan Holiday. He raves about how this book (and this translation in particular) changed his life. I finally decided to give it a go.

Essentially it is the thoughts of the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius. It was never meant to be published. He used it to think through things and remind himself of the kind of man he wanted to be. It reads mainly as a kind of list of aphorisms.

This book is unique. It is a glimpse into the thinking of an actual Roman Emperor. But I just couldn’t get through it. It was interesting, but very repetitive. I also appreciated the translator’s introduction and how it gave context. It really made the writing accessible to the modern reader. Maybe too accessible. It didn’t sound that surprising or out of the ordinary. That’s part of what made it so amazing and so dull. About three-quarters of the way through the book, I just couldn’t bring myself to pick it up any more and abandoned it.

My rating: 3/5