Iterations and other stories (collection)

Introduction

First things first:

If you’re browsing through this book in a bookstore, rush to the checkout immediately and BUY THE BOOK.

If you’ve already bought the book, don’t just leave it on the coffee table to impress your friends—SIT DOWN AND READ EVERY STORY.

There: I’ve fulfilled my obligations as an introduction writer. Now I can relax and just generally burble on about the glories of Robert J. Sawyer.

Also known as the Rob-Man.

Or the Robster.

Or R.J.

Or the Dean of Canadian Science Fiction.

Or the Man Who Really Deserves A Cool Nickname But No One Has Quite Found Anything That Clicks. It’s hard to come up with a short snappy sobriquet that combines talented writer, inspired visionary, and good friend all in one tight verbal package.

I’ve known Rob for more than a decade, and I’m honored to be the person who gets to gush up front about Rob’s first collection of short stories. It’s my chance to repay him for all the support and advice he’s given me over the years, not to mention the pleasure of reading his work.

Of course, Rob is best known in science-fiction circles for his novels: from his earliest book, Golden Fleece (told mostly from the viewpoint of a serial-killing computer), through his Quintaglio trilogy (featuring dinosaur versions of Galileo, Darwin, and Freud), to the space opera of Starplex and on into his near-future pieces (The Terminal Experiment, Frameshift, Factoring Humanity, Calculating God, et al.), which are balanced mixes of thriller-adventure stories, well-researched speculation, and philosophical musings. You owe it to yourself to get your hands on those books, too… but in the meantime, the book you’re holding now is an admirable microcosm of Rob Sawyer’s interests and concerns.

You’ll see, for example, Rob’s ongoing fascination with What Might Have Been, often embodied in multiple realities showing alternative ways in which one person’s life might have unfolded: what would have happened if you made a different decision at some crucial moment, if you turned left instead of right? There’s also the theme of simulated life, found in several of his novels—human intelligence copied into a computer, usually as a way of cheating death, but sometimes as a technique for understanding who a man or woman truly is. Several of the pieces in this book also reveal a covert inclination toward fantasy; Rob will probably deny it, but hey, there are three stories featuring the devil, one with vampires, and another that literally sends someone to hell. (And he keeps claiming to be a “hard science fiction” writer!)

Last and most enduringly, this book shows Rob’s love of Earth’s distant past: dinosaurs, early hominids, and paleontologists pop up over and over again, sometimes as protagonists, sometimes in disguise as aliens, sometimes in even more surprising forms… but always depicted with affection and a detailed attention to scientific accuracy. These are not trendy stage props thrown in for their current Coolness Factor—they matter to Rob, and he makes them matter to us.

Enough preamble. I could go on to enthuse about what a fine human being Rob is, or what important contributions he’s made to Canadian science fiction and to the science-fiction community as a whole; perhaps I could come up with a few telling anecdotes about the guy (or at least some juicy embarrassing ones); I could even rustle up praise and testimonials from dozens of other writers who are glad to have Rob Sawyer as their friend; but if you have any sense, you aren’t interested in blather, you just want to read some good stories.

Lucky you. This book is full of them. Enjoy!

—James Alan Gardner

James Alan Gardner is a Nebula and Hugo Award finalist whose short stories have appeared in Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine and The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction. His novels include Expendable, Vigilant, Hunted, and Ascending.