The Expert System's Brother

A short piece that nevertheless manages the richness in worldbuilding that I have come to associate with Tchaikovsky's work. While I didn't like this one quite as much as the novella Dogs of War, it was still very good. Tchaikovsky again shows how very skilled he is at capturing the voices of his ch......more

Protagonist, Handry, is all but cast-out from his society after an accident. He is shunned and ignored, but saved from isolation, for a time, by his sister. However, she is infiltrated with the ghost of decision-making and becomes society's new doctor, after the demise of the last one. With her new......more

Brilliant world building full of mystery and otherworldly strangeness, and character development with real emotional resonance. Two critical aspects of a compelling story, rarely done in equal regard with such mastery, and accomplished here with an amazing economy. Plus, as I've come to expect from......more

Another masterclass in world-building from Adrian Tchaikovsky, author of the superlative Children of Time, with its sequel Children of Ruin out in May 2019. It is great to have Tchaikovsky bring his particular brand of hard sociological SF to the tor.com novella line-up, which continues to attract s......more

More of a 3.5 for the rating, I'd just put this novella on the shelf that I'd name "a light-touch fish-out-of-water SF". It's a voyage of self-discovery that reads like a fantasy novel even though there are some rather strong SFnal ties just below the surface that are pretty easy to follow as a reade......more