Charles Stross is nothing if not versatile – and for a reader who might be unsure whether they want to read the space opera of Singularity Sky and Iron Sunrise, or the much more human-scale horror of The Atrocity Archives and techno-thriller high-jinks in Halting State, this is an ideal way to sample some of the different facets of his output. It includes two novella-length pieces, so the writing definitely has a chance to stretch out and luxuriate in the plethora of ideas that Stross bombards us with.

Stross describes ‘A Colder War’ as his homage to H.P. Lovecraft – but it blends many other influences too, from John Le Carré (espionage and superpower distrust) to Alan Moore (the dread of the inevitable nuclear apolocalypse) via Stargate-style intersteller gates, and mixes in dark forces from the deep that the human race has tried to control for its own benefit without ever really understanding. It’s a great feat of speculation to imagine something worse that nuclear weapons, but Stross manages it, and also does a great job of capturing the mindset of the policymakers who became so blasé about weapons of last resort.

By way of a total contrast, ‘Trunk and Disorderly’ is a homage to, of all the writers, P.G. Wodehouse – it doesn’t take long to spot the obvious similaries between Ralphie and Wodehouse’s inept hero Bertie Wooster, not the resemblance of Alison Feng to that greatest of fixers, the butler Jeeves. If Wodehouse’s imagination could have conceived of space travel, irascible miniature mammoths, sober pills, sentient robots and all the other ephemera of the intergalactic high life, this is perhaps the story he would have written. Stross modestly says in his afterword that comedy is hard to do – but he carries it off really well, with plenty of smiles and a few belly-laughs.

The novella ‘Palimpsest’ is where Stoss really gets to show off his hard SF chops – the essence of the story being the tale of one agent within a time-travelling, time-policing civilisation called the Statis, who bend every resource and technology to preserving the Earth and humanity with it. This involves all kinds of periodic reseeding and rebooting, as the human race has a nasty tendency to go extinct, and allows Stross to indulge in some massive-timescale speculation about how to keep life on Earth going as long as possible as the universe begins its long decline in to entropy, and the stars die (very reminiscent of Alastair Reynolds). ‘Back to the Future’ this isn’t, as our hero has to contend with the seriously mind-expanding nature of time travel (to enroll in the Stasis he had to kill his own grandfather), with its cul-de-sacs and timeloops and anomalies and interventions. It’s an involved story (potentially confusing if you don’t pay close attention) but very impressive.

We also have an enjoyable speculation on the consequences of Internet regulation, ‘Unwirer’, written with Cory Doctorow; ‘Missile Gap’, a clever tale of the human race being transplanted (or perhaps copied?) on to a gigantic, and completely flat world that they must share with who knows what, and one of my favourites, ‘Down on the Farm’, which features Bob Howard, hero of The Atrocity Archives and The Jennifer Morgue, in a very amusing investigation involving officious robot nurses, a mad computerised matron and some very absent-minded academics.

The emphasis in this collection is on quality and diversity over quantity, which is absolutely the right thing to have done. For those unfamiliar with Charles Stross, it’s a glimpse in to the real range of his talent and vision; for those, like me, who have perhaps focused on one aspect of his output to the exclusion of others, it’s a great eye-opener and a spur to extend their reach in to his bibliography. Terribly clever, and highly recommended.

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