It's hard to believe this is an original anthology, because this collection is so solid. Filled with great writers, the stories are original and interesting. It's rare to see quality this consistent in any short story collection, but this was great. Thanks to NetGalley for letting me read this.

Note: I received a free unpublished proof of this book, for a limited time, in exchange for an honest review. All opinions here are my own.

Another day, another anthology review…of New Year, New You.

This book does not have much of what I would call “graphically NSFW” content, but I recommend it to adult readers (18+) because they are the main target audience that I think would have the most interest in the book. There are also some scenes here and there of violence, death, gore, bullying, toxic relationships, and other heavy themes.

I picked this one up (well, insofar as you can ‘pick up’ an ebook) because it contained work by Elizabeth Bear and Daryl Gregory, whom I’d actually heard of before. The other authors featured in this anthology are alumni of the 2023 Viable Paradise workshop, an annual event run by some pretty big names in science fiction and fantasy. While I don’t think authors need to be famous for their work to be good, I have found that I prefer to read works by authors who are already moderately successful or at least have some level of experience and instruction in writing. These authors don’t necessarily have better ideas or insights, but their work tends to read more smoothly, particularly as they usually have editors and some sense of how things should sound and flow.

This isn’t to suggest that people should not self-publish or attempt to publish as beginners—just that writing, however subjective, nonetheless has some crunchier mechanical and technical aspects that take time to figure out.

Not only is this a speculative fiction anthology—the sort of thing I frequently review here—but it is themed around reinvention, a theme that I typically enjoy, particularly in stories about physical transformation but also in any stories with genuinely good character development. If you have read a lot of my work on Quora, you may know that I particularly like shapeshifter stories, and while I have not had many chances to review such works, this collection does have a couple in there.

“Better Me Is Fun at Parties” by F. E. Choe—This story is based on an idea that I’m sure has been done in science fiction before—what if you could have a perfect clone of yourself that was better in every way? However, the narrator’s journey and relationship with her perfect copy is delightfully unpredictable. Choe doesn’t disappoint with this strong start to the anthology.
“The Holy Daughters of Eng Mac” by C. R. Kellogg—This selection takes place in a more fantasy-based world, surrounding a girl who lives within two different tribal societies in a world with spirits and magical powers. There is no physical transformation or cloning in this story, but the main character’s conflict with her sister (half-sister?) and subsequent character development upon being sent to live with her father’s tribe is intriguing.
“A Facade of Faith” by Shannon Spieler—Another fantasy-based work, this story is set in a fantasy world with ten gods and eleven continents. The protagonists worship one goddess as part of a very Catholic-inspired religious institution with a strict hierarchy, and are at conflict with another continent and their own god. This isn’t really accurate to how most religions work in real life—most religions, outside of Christianity, Islam, and some segments of Hinduism and Buddhism, do not typically take issue with other people worshipping other gods, and in polytheistic religions people typically worship multiple, if not all, of the gods, even if they have a particular connection with one or more of them. That said, this is a fantasy world that isn’t really trying to represent the real world, so that’s fine by me, especially as the author is pretty clearly inspired by Catholicism, which is antagonistic to many other religions. There is some strange political intrigue here, and I can’t really mention the “reinvention” theme without a major spoiler.
“A Thousand Gomorrahs” by Daryl Gregory—What if alien stingrays from space descended upon Earth’s major cities and started eating everybody? Where would you go and what would you do? In this short tale, a group of friends in Calgary decide how to start over.
“Father Time Dares You to Dream” by Trae Hawkins—With an omniscient narrator and genuine joy and hope, Hawkins weaves a tale of the post-apocalyptic, vaguely anarcho-communist society we all want to live in. I wholeheartedly recommend it to any fans of collectivist tree-based living. (You know who you are.)
“The Manifold Aspects of Horace” by Taylor Lykiardopoulos—Imagine if Disney was a cult—like, literally a cult, not just a corporation with a massive following of weird adults with no critical thinking skills. And it was in space. And all of the animators genuinely lived like monks. And somebody inevitably had a crisis of faith. This is a story about that.
“Ugly” by Julie Danvers—A relatively typical fractured-fairy-tale offering, now a staple of short fiction anthologies, novellas, and secondary-school theatre productions. In which it turns out that all of the princesses in the fairy tales…are the same person. For the most part. And all because one of Cinderella’s mice bullied her ugly stepsister about her looks until she ran away to marry a prince herself. Those poor girls never can catch a break, can they?
“Aurori Deserti” by Rowan Copley—This one reminded me a bit of Annihilation by Jeff Vandermeer and a bit of “The Endless” (2018), a film I saw a few years ago. If you like mysterious stories with paranormal stuff and bittersweet endings, you’ll enjoy this.
“Katabasis” by Alec J. Marsh—Another Greek mythology retelling. It seems no anthology, awards list, or new releases display is complete without one these days. Frankly, I don’t really care for the genre. It’s an alright story, though, and I would be curious to read more work by this author.
“The Ravishing Moon Princess” by Charlotte Ahlin—Okay, this one is pretty silly. Think of the cheesiest science fiction story or movie that you know of, with amusement parks on the Moon and people traveling between planets like fashionable American vacationers from the 1960s. The ending is delightfully unpredictable and tops off the rest of the silly pretty nicely.
“The Catadromous Nature of Eel” by Sophia Tao—A very “weird fiction” shapeshifter story about monster girls who may or may not be human-eel hybrids. The overall tone is a bit grim but if you like sad, weird stories about sad, weird girls (like I do), you’ll love it.
“The (Re)Creation of New Terraform” by Adianu Etinose—The classic “supernatural star-crossed lovers” story with an octopus-girl and an elf. Quirky, tense, and ultimately heartfelt. I love the overall tone and would love to read more of Etinose’s work. I still do not quite see how the title relates to the story, but if it is seen as what happens shortly before a great period of reinvention, it makes sense.
“Redo” by Brigitte Winter—At this point, the “what if you could redo X thing in your life?” trope is a little bit cliche (cf. The Midnight Library by Matt Haig), but this story manages to give it some fresh life. No real surprises here, but great writing and sympathetic characters make it enjoyable and emotionally-impactful.
“All The Time In The World And None At All” by Allison Pottern—More time travel, more mystery, more emotional struggles. I particularly liked the author’s very literal incorporation of the “new year” theme. I also liked the whales.
“12 Hours to Anoesis” by Avani Vaghela—A fresh, tense take on the “what if everybody recorded their memories?” trope, taken to an extreme. This one is more “science fiction-y” than the previous few stories, given that the takes on time travel portrayed are more “fantasy” in how they are written, which isn’t a mark against either approach; just an interesting thing I noticed. The whole society of agents bit reminds me a bit of the secret society in The Magician King by Lev Grossman, what with their secret names, complex communications, and worrisome social dynamics.
“Fracture” by Melinda A. Smith—Another technology-focused story with a few twists and turns. Technically this one is more fantasy than science fiction because it talks about multiple parallel universes, and while some people have proposed the existence of such an idea, there is not really any evidence to suggest this is actually happening and even the most outlandish theories on this topic suggest that we couldn’t really do anything with these universes even if they definitely existed. I found the author’s suggestions of what people might do if they did live in that sort of world and had that magical power very interesting.
“Wave Walkers” by Victor Pope—This one was particularly weird, and another interesting combination of science fiction and fantasy elements. Come for the weird physics, stay for the…magical color-changing water-strider things?
“Mars Monkeys” by Neil Flinchbaugh—A relatively simple tale on parenthood, childhood, and sea monkeys from Mars. There isn’t actually much science fiction or reinvention in this one, but it does fit the bill and makes for a sweet story. Can we have “Mars Beanie Babies” next?
“No Moon and Flat Calm” by Elizabeth Bear—A fun, action-filled story about emergency preparedness—in space. Another great example of a classic formula with winning characters, great writing, and a satisfying conclusion. It’s more “coming-of-age” on the reinvention front—no shapeshifting here—but it’s a fine work in that genre.
“Spaced” by Catherine Castellani—I think it’s quite sad that Castellani thinks that we will still have annoying rich kid bullies in the space age when people have space stations and go to astronaut school. I also think it’s very sad that she is most likely correct. Nevertheless, this is a heartwarming story about friends banding together against those mean kids who inevitably come along to ruin the fun.
“Athena’s Voyage” by Nick DePasquale—This story relies on another trope that’s been popular in the past few years—sentient AI spaceships (cf. Paradise-1 by David Wellington)! The “re-invention” in this one is not clear until the end, but it’s worth the journey.
“My Lover’s Music Box” by A. E. Kirchoff—”My Lover’s Music Box” is a futuristic Gothic romance, almost like “The Matrix” (1999) by way of Paul Shapera’s offbeat musical debut “Dolls of New Albion.” It’s a bit creepy and very sad, but ultimately uplifting and hopeful.
“chat_transcript_elsie_user260916_2189–12–13T21–18–32.661Z” by Ash Howell—This short tale is an epistolary story in the tradition of “The Cookie Monster” by Vernor Vinge, updated a little for the 2020s. I would be interested to read more work by this author, maybe taking place in the same world.
“Ada the Last Daughter: On Blackhole Cosmology and Computation” by Chris Campbell—This one was a bit confusing to me as I wasn’t sure how everything was supposed to be happening, but I thought the concept was interesting. I can’t go into any more detail on it, though, or I’ll spoil everything.

Overall, I was really impressed with this anthology and I highly recommend it to readers of contemporary science fiction and fantasy. Even the “worst” stories were good; I only disliked them due to lack of personal interest in the themes or writing style. I don’t know how widely-read this one will be, but I could see something in here getting nominated for a Locus Award or similar.

TL;DR A good collection of SF stories.

This is a collection that’s loosely about re-invention and rediscovery (like, New Year’s resolutions), featuring a mix of what looks like established writers and new. To run through just some of the ideas in here: Alter-you who is so much better at, like, everything, in *Better Me is Fun at Parties*, by F. E. Choe; a new beginning for sisters with a very toxic relationship in *The Holy Daughters of Eng Mac*, by C. R. Kellogg; ambition, and ways to get what you want in Shannon Spieler’s *A Facade of Faith*; running for the hills after an alien invasion in *A Thousand Gomorrahs* by Darryl Gregory; a reworking of Cinder Ella (:)) in Julie Danvers’s *Ugly*; a supernatural event (alien abduction, maybe?) in the desert, beautifully described, in Rowan Copley’s *Aurora Deserti*; Hades and Persephone in Alec J. Marsh’s *Katabasis*; and extreme bodysculpting and/or dysmorphia in *The Ravishing Moon Princess* by Charlotte Ahlin (great ending).

There’s an eel person in Sophia Tao’s *The Catadromous Nature of Eel*; interspecies love in Adianu Etinose’s *The (Re)Creation of New Terraform*; love across timelines, and toxicity, in Brigitte Winter’s *Redo*; more time travel in *All the Time in the World and None at All* by Allison Pottern; a beautiful story about future medical science in *Fracture*, by Melinda A. Smith; dimensional escapism in Victor Pope’s *Wave Walkers* (I would totally want to go there), which reminded me, of course, of Abbott’s *Flatland*; and you may already know (I did) Elizabeth Bear’s *No Moon and Flat Calm*, about postgrad apprentices who arrive at a space station in crisis.

Catherine Castellani’s *Spaced* is an excellent story on being an outsider and still making it. *Athena’s Voyage* by Nick DePasquale is about my favourite thing in the world, sentient spaceships (OpenAI has nothing on this, so far). A. E. Kirchoff’s *My Lover’s Music Box* is a melancholy story about death and a kind of afterlife. And doesn’t *chat_transcript_elsie_user260916_2189-12-13T21-18-32.661Z* have the best title? I enjoyed Ash Howell’s story about an uploaded consciousness, and how the ending suggests more. And then Chris Campbell's story of the last person and possible simulated realities, *Ada the Last Daughter: On Blackhole Cosmology and Computation*.

All of these stories are super imaginative with many interesting ideas—as all SF should be—and fun to read. Of course, as happens with collections, I didn’t enjoy every single story. No matter: if you enjoy SF, you’ll enjoy this unique collection. Recommended.

Thanks to Victory Editing NetGalley Co-op/NetGalley and Immortal Jellyfish Press for DRC access.