"Paying It Forward" by Michael A. Burstein
"Tiny Berries" by Richard A. Lovett
"The First Lesson" by Edward Muller
"Pale Horse" by Kevin Levites
"Section Seven" by John G. Henry
"The Watering Hole" by Pete D. Manison
"The Study of Ants" by Carl Frederick

This month we've got the first part of a serial by Edward M. Lerner (which I won't be reviewing, in accordance with Tangent policy), two novelettes and five short stories. There are no novellas or Probability Zero short-shorts this issue.

"Paying It Forward" by Michael A. Burstein is the first of our novelettes, and is set in the year 2070, focusing on a science fiction writer dying from an inoperable brain tumour. It's told in first-person POV through which the writer is reflecting on his life, career, and long-term online relationship and email correspondence with an older sf writer who became his mentor and friend. There's only one slight twist to this – the other author had died before they began the relationship (ironically also from a brain tumour), so how is this possible? We don't find out until the end of the story, but along the way we see a nice relationship developing between the two, with some amusing touches to the story. In one scene we find out that unfortunately spam still exists in 2070, and is possibly even worse than it is now. In one session, out of twenty-seven email messages to the writer, only one isn't spam, so it doesn't look like things are going to get better in future. And we also hear of the Second Golden Age SF Rennaisance (gimme a time machine, quick!), and the new generation of kids raised on the fantasies of J.K. Rowling and Tamora Pierce turning to SF (I thought this was *very* funny).

I've always liked Michael Burstein's writing. Unlike many other "hard" SF writers he always manages to imbue his stories with decent characterisation and a lot of humanity and emotional content, usually sadness associated with death or some other tragic situation (at least I've found this to be true in the stories I've read). He does that again in this story through the introspective of the dying writer, and the email correspondence format which gives a nice personal feel to the story and the relationship between the two writers. It felt vaguely reminiscent of the entertaining sf movie "Frequency", which had the weird time-jumping CB radio relationship between father and son separated by thirty years, although that film had more of an action-adventure/thriller format based around altering history and a happier ending.

The ending of "Paying it Forward" came as no great surprise to me as it had seemed pretty obvious from the start. In true Analog form, the mystery of how the writer has been communicating with the "dead" author for many years owes nothing to any fantasies of the "afterlife", but hinges on a complex combination of the Many Worlds theme and an elaborate computer program/AI created by the dead author which allows email communication with another living version of the deceased writer in an alternate reality. Of course the main character accepts the offer of the computer program from his friend. It won't stop him from dying, but might ensure that he "lives on" in some form with possibly another young author accepting advice and friendship from an alternate-reality version of him in much the same way as he had done with his own mentor. I think most of us, writers or not, would like to be remembered fondly and continue influencing others long after our deaths – it's only natural to hope that you've "mattered" or made a difference, and to be totally forgotten is certainly an unappealing form of oblivion. And writing does offer the hope that your works, and you, will be remembered for long after you're dead. I don't know if Michael Burstein feels the strong need to have his life and works remembered in the way that his main character does (I would assume so), but if so, I hope he gets his wish.

Richard A. Lovett's "Tiny Berries" is our second novelette, and is quite a topical one, dealing with one of the greatest scourges of modern life – internet spam. Spam also gets a mention in Michael Burstein's novelette, but in this story it's the main theme. The story focuses on a guy with a few major hang-ups – he's had a complicated and unhappy childhood, can't seem to get a girlfriend, and thinks he loves his best friend's wife – and who becomes a focus of a radically complex new type of spam, finding almost every area of his life plagued by it. He lives in the relatively near future, in a society that has "smart" electronics which are mostly hooked up to the 'net, and this society is even more dependent on "connected" technology than ours is. But not only do these stupid "smart" gizmos think they're cleverer than we are, they can also become a menace when taken over by ever more ingenious spammers. Despite citizens spending a fortune on personal firewalls and other never-ending anti-spam upgrades (it's a big business, which makes me very suspicious about a possible link between the spammers and commercial interests,) the spammers are winning the war. These guys seem to be able to break in from anywhere – satellite link, online diaries, email, anywhere – and our main character finds his clock taken over, as well as his phone, fax, email, PIM, and anything else connected to the 'net. And it's understandably driving him nuts. Eventually we have the final straw versus camel's back as his computer-driven car is hijacked (or spamjacked) when it is taken over by the same spammers, and it drives him to a spot where he (and quite a few others) are being held hostage until they pay up for the "Tiny Berries" of the title (I say a shotgun in each car might even things up a bit – let's see a Kill All Spammers law being introduced by popular demand). Rescue by the police is little consolation, as the spammers escape and it could happen again at any time.

So he turns to his best friend (who just happens to be a computer whiz specializing in firewalls and anti-spam technology) for help. We get a nice cosy little group putting their heads together – the "vic" (computer victim i.e. the protagonist,) the best friend and his aforementioned wife, and an attractive lady "consultant" who the main character happened to meet during the "spamjacking" affair, as she was helping the police with investigations. A bit of social mingling and a sprinkling of romance ensues (plus a hint to geeks that geekery ain't everything, so get a life), and our put-upon protagonist not only seems to have acquired a very active romantic life with the new female acquaintance (getting his head straight about his friend's wife in the process), but he also provides the idea for his more technically adept companions which forms the seeds of a spanner in the spammers' works.

This is an entertaining story overall, with decent characterisation and a a few nice bits of humour. But the underlying theme of the spam menace is nothing to laugh about, and one we should all take very seriously. Spam and spammers are evil, evil, evil, and have the potential to completely derail the potential benefits of the internet and destroy the very structure of "connected" society. Indeed they are already doing so, with the incredible rise in spam that is choking the internet and this sees no end in sight unless co-ordinated extreme anti-spam penalties are brought into law by all the nations of the world (capital punishment would be nice, for a start – what gives you the idea that I don't like spammers?). If they aren't stopped, any near-future society which will be even more "connected" than ours will face a scenario such as the one posited in this story. Or possibly much, much worse. Maybe I'm too old for this internet lark, but I think it's incredibly stupid to have every electrical device hooked up to the internet – I think media devices such as computers and maybe televisions are more than enough – but it seems that the rest of the "wired" world disagrees with me, and is heading ever faster towards a "connected" world and major problems with spammers that will dwarf those we have at the moment.

"The First Lesson" by Edward Muller is the first of our short stories, and is set many centuries in the future on an inhospitable colony world in the Alpha Centauri A star system. The human race has discovered the secret of immortality, and can now indulge in interstellar travel, albeit of the tedious Slower Than Light variety. But a mystery has been found on the colony world, a Big Mysterious Alien Object, an immense vault, and humanity is being given a test to pass before it can meet the aliens who built it. But a lesson must also be learned first in order to pass that test, and the terrifying alien robotic guardian that protects the vault has destroyed any robotic probes that have come near it. How can they enter the vault and solve the problem that the aliens have set for them?

Enter our protagonist – a courageous eighteen year-old young man, who is convinced that he has the answer, and is willing to risk his life facing the guardian in order to prove he's right. And prove it he does, teaching the rest of his older fellow humans the required lesson in the process. For the aliens who built the vault have long ago travelled down the same path as humanity, and wish to help us learn from their mistakes. They, too, discovered the secret of immortality, and started safely exploring the universe with robotic probes before following them out into space. But they learned that "playing it safe" would condemn them to an eternity of boredom, and that they, and we, must start taking risks if life is to continue to be worth living.

I took this story to contain a veiled warning against the current trend of NASA to use robotic forms of space exploration rather than manned missions. But the overlying theme is that you won't get anywhere if you don't take risks. The immortality angle introduces the notion that people would be afraid to take risks if they are immortal because they fear death more than short-lived people, who are accustomed to death as a part of everyday life. The human society portrayed in this story is made up almost totally of old people who have been immortal for a long time, and there are very few young people in it. Old people are very conservative by nature, and not prone to taking risks, and it takes the rash, impetuous young man in this story to take the necessary risk that his older immortal colleagues won't. I'd also go as far as to say that immortality would be a curse, and the death of us as a species, driving us into boredom, stagnation and eventual extinction. We need young people and short life-spans to keep our species vibrant, taking risks, and always pushing forward. For what reason would we have to hurry up and achieve things as individuals and as a species if we haven't got death to spur us on and we've got eternity to get around to doing stuff?

Kevin Levites' "Pale Horse" is a very short story, not much longer than a short-short. It deals with the potential unethical use of technology in a near future society, and the rights (or wrongs) of active opposition to it, even if that opposition leads to violence and fatalities. In this society the state has a questionable policy of punishment for condemned murderers. Before it executes the condemned, a copy of his/her mind is downloaded into a virtual environment known as "Judicial Hell", where it will suffer for all eternity. This is vigorously opposed by religious groups of all shades, who see the state as "Playing God" and messing with the Afterlife and God's designs for the condemned.

The story revolves around a Catholic priest, a strong active opponent of Judicial Hell, who has the backing of many others among the clergy and the general population. As he does his rounds of the prisons and the condemned, he has another more secret agenda in mind, as he brings not only final absolution to the condemned but also a way of escaping Judicial Hell via poisoned Communion hosts which provide an always-welcome method of voluntary suicide for the desperate. When he's caught and condemned for his own (mis)deeds, we find out that not only had he provided the anonymous tip that led to his own arrest, but he made sure that he'd be found guilty by hiring an incompetent lawyer. He wanted to be caught and condemned. But why? We find out as the Communion host given to him by his visiting priest contains something other than poison, something slightly viral that his downloaded mind will use to erase the virtual abomination of Judicial Hell and free its inmates from everlasting torment.

Despite being a rather short story, this tale introduces several interesting questions. Are copies of ourselves the same as the real thing? Even if there is doubt of this, is there any way we should take the risk the state does in this story, just in case we're wrong? Should the state consider the views or provide exemption for those with religious or moral objections, and who do believe that a copy is the real thing? And are those who are opposed to unethical laws such as this within their rights to oppose them, even if this leads to violence or murder? Interesting questions, I hope you'll agree.

"Section Seven" by John G. Henry takes a look at the importance of uniform standards in holding together large political or social entities, in this case a galactic empire or federation. What happens when individual members decide to do their own thing and start diverging from those standards? This obviously can't be allowed, as it would only be the start of the erosion as others also start breaking away until the Empire eventually fragments and breaks up. Take away the uniformity and you take away the Empire. But how are the renegade elements to be brought back into line, especially in situations where the use of force is not only undesirable but out of the question?

Enter Section Seven, the Galactic Federation's deadliest weapon, an organisation so secret that nobody even knows it exists, aside from its members and superiors. The most shadowy of black ops organisations, Section Seven is accountable to nobody but itself, specialising in sabotage, misdirection, and other subtle high-tech methods that can accomplish what brute force never could. Its members go where they will and are masters of disguise and limitless false identities. They remind me more than anything of the team from the classic 1960s television series "Mission Impossible", transplanted to an interstellar milieu, a team of experts who tackle the most complex of problems using even more complex methods. They go in stealthily, get the job done and get out again just as stealthily, leaving no trace of their work or that they'd even been there.

In this case, the target is a renegade world which has started to introduce its own standards in weaponry, transport, and even the operating system software that controls the entire planet's network, security, financial and data transactions. In a matter of weeks Section Seven has woven its magic and the new planetary standards mysteriously begin showing glaring flaws and start crumbling, with day-to-day life interrupted and in uproar, much to the rising anger of the inconvenienced population. The result? Mission accomplished, as the new "unsuccessful" standards are scrapped, and the reliable old Galactic Federation standards are enthusiastically reinstated, once again bringing peace and harmony to the Federation. Sneaky, eh? Just my kind of people. Who needs messy old wars when you can get things done as easily and as quietly as this?

"The Watering Hole" by Pete D. Manison is set at an undefined point in the future on a partially terraformed Mars, where thousands of small biomes (a combination of residential settlement and scientific station) of human settlers are gradually introducing life to Mars, spreading out until one day the entire planet will be covered in green and blue. The focus of the story is one of those settlements, where we meet a solitary man and his dog (plus the AI, which looks after the house and its surrounding environment) who take care of their little oasis, in particular the "watering hole" of the story title, a place to which the large number of genetically engineered animal stock imported from Earth come to drink. The oases around this and other watering holes are allowing the populations of animals and plants to grow rapidly and spread out slowly but steadily over the Martian surface. Oxygen levels are going up gradually due to the spread of plants, but it will be centuries before it is breathable for anything but the species of plants and animals genetically engineered to survive on Mars. However the air pressure in lowlying areas has become dense enough for a human to walk around without a spacesuit, wearing only a breathing mask. The water in the watering hole is provided by melting sub-surface permafrost and the water is piped to the surface, where the newly elevated atmospheric pressure allows it to remain in liquid form for a short while before it evaporates back into the Martian atmosphere.

But something strange is happening at this particular oasis. The oxygen level is rising more quickly than expected, the water is taking longer to evaporate and the greenery is spreading out from the settlement a little too rapidly. And there are signs that a strange, unknown type of animal is frequenting the area around the watering hole, as evidenced by the strange tracks that the man and his dog have found. They manage to trap one, and the AI deducts that it isn't a living creature at all, but an incredibly advanced alien self-replicating terraforming machine which has lain dormant on Mars for millions of years. Only recently awakened by the presence of liquid water at the watering hole, it has begun to make copies of itself and terraform the area much more quickly than humans can. If they keep reproducing at the same rate (there will be billions of them), Mars will be completely habitable in a mere seven years. But an incident at the watering hole in which the dog is injured during an accidental encounter with some terraformers, plus some wildly skewed and irrational memories of his wife's dislike of the whole terraforming process, and our resident human goes postal and starts destroying the terraformers. Only a tense encounter with the AI, which tells him a few home truths about himself and his dead wife's true feelings towards Mars, prevents him from committing a terrible mistake, and persuades him to do the right thing and hand the last remaining terraformer over to the authorities.

There are some nice interpersonal relationships in the story, all the more strange in that they're between human and dog, and human and AI. The man has a really close relationship with the dog, who is his constant companion. But the AI is also treated as part of the family (it's very similar to HAL9000, but more "human" – it certainly has a more developed sense of humour,) and the man and AI have some quite interesting conversations. But perhaps the strongest relationship is built on a foundation of bereavement. The man's wife died two years before, they all miss her, and we see the lasting effects of the loss on the man, the dog, and the AI. She had been a vital part of the "family" and had helped her husband build this place. All this despite the fact that she didn't agree with the terraforming of Mars, preferring to leave it in its wild, natural condition. But he sees her "love" for the unterraformed Mars through rose-tinted glasses. The AI later tells him the truth, that she had hated Mars in the beginning, seeing it for what it really was (a hostile, deadly world,) and only gradually learned to love the planet because he did.

These differences in view between the husband and wife are pretty much the same as the "Greens" vs "Reds" differences in Kim Stanley Robinson's "Mars" series. The "Greens" believe that we should terraform Mars, bringing life to a previously dead world. The "Reds" argue that we should leave Mars in its wild, pristine state, and that we don't have the right to pollute such beauty with the stain of terrestrial life. Me, I'm firmly in the "Green" camp, and view the "Red" argument as a load of stupid romantic clap-trap, arguing for maintaining a dead, sterile world instead of creating a vibrant, living one. An absolutely insane notion, in my opinion. There is no virtue in being dead, a pristine sterile wilderness serves no purpose (other than to make romantics feel good,) and life of any sort, even microscopic, is preferable to barren sterility. Most of the universe is dead and sterile, and life needs every fragile toe-hold that it can get. And what if Earth is the only place in the universe with life? Oh, I know all the arguments against that, but can we really risk taking the view that life exists elsewhere without definite proof? Can we risk keeping all our eggs in one basket and taking the chance that all life on Earth, and hence all life everywhere, may be wiped out by a natural disaster such as an asteroid impact? We simply can't take the risk of life becoming extinct in this way, and the best way to ensure that it doesn't is to spread it to other worlds. I'd go as far as to say that it's our moral duty to make sure that we spread the seed of life outside of Earth, to every world we can reach. And "up yours" to those imbecilic "Reds".

I've always liked this kind of story. Space sciences have always been a big favourite of mine, and anything to do with terraforming in particular. If there's anything that gets me going more than an entertaining escapist tale, it's a futuristic story set on another world that is within the bounds of possibility. The idea that we might actually be able to live on Mars someday, to terraform it and make it into a living world makes me really tingle all over. How far in the future would I reckon this is story set? I'd say quite a few centuries. It's obvious that Mars has been settled for quite some time – thousands of settlements and scientific stations all over the planet, and there's even a mention of a "Marineris Library" which is a sure sign that civilisation is well entrenched on this world. Mars has already been partially terraformed, which also indicates that humans have been there for quite a while as terraforming takes a long time. There's also an element of the attractive wild west frontier life in the isolated pioneering Martian settlements comprised of single family units, which some might find endearing (as I do).

"The Study of Ants" by Carl Frederick is our final short story of the month. I found it to be a rather frightening and potentially cautionary tale set in the Amazon jungle, where a scientist involved in research with ants discovers a lot more than he'd bargained for. He's been teaching the ants to play chess but finds that they quickly learn to play the game only too well. The revelation that they have a "mass" or "hive" form of collective intelligence and may be the ones studying us (rather than the reverse) is a scary one, as is the dedicated stupity of the main character in continuing to try to communicate with them further, along with the possibility than his experiments were responsible for creating this new superorganism in the first place. Despite the optimism of the protagonist I have flashes of the old cliché about meddling scientists messing around with nature and in things they don't understand. I dunno if I've been watching too many old sci-fi "B" movies or if anti-science irrationality is rearing its ugly head, but this is the sort of story that makes me feel a little uneasy about the ethics and wisdom of some areas of scientific research. Maybe there are some areas we'd be better off leaving alone.

Aside from that, I don't like creepy-crawlies, and I felt genuinely queasy during a couple of the scenes, namely the one in which the two armies of ants settled a territorial dispute by playing a game of chess (and the losers don't resist as they are slaughtered,) and the other in which the main character's ex-boss is forced to play chess with the ants (and is punished for cheating,) with the entire surrounding lab – floors, walls, curtains, ceiling – completely covered with ants and preventing his escape. Those two scenes sent a shudder up my spine.

A more "down to Earth" story than "The Spacemice Incident" in the previous month's Analog, "The Study of Ants" shows that Carl Frederick can certainly switch between different story types easily enough. This is a good story, but a lot darker, more menacing, and with none of the humour of the previous story, and as a result of this (and those damned bugs) I didn't find reading it quite as pleasant an experience. But that's my personal taste, and possibly a good sign that it's had a deeper effect on me than the lighter story had, even if an unpleasant one.

Overall this is another consistent issue of Analog, and I didn't dislike any of the stories (quite enjoyed them all, actually.) My own personal favourite for this month is actually a short story, which is surprising, as I usually favour novelettes or novellas. It's Pete D. Manison's "The Watering Hole," although Richard Lovett's novelette ("Tiny Berries") and the Henry ("Section Seven") and Muller ("The First Lesson") short stories also stood out for me, as did the Burstein novelette ("Paying it Forward.") The other stories were worth a read as well, but these would be my pick of the bunch. It's interesting to note that three of the five that stood out for me are set against an extraterrestrial background rather than a "down-to-earth" one, as, admittedly, I do enjoy stories of this type (although if a story's a good one, it really doesn't matter where it's set.)

Phil Friel lives in the city of Derry, in Northern Ireland. He's been reading SF since the late 1960s (his first SF novel was "The Time Machine" when he was eight years old,) and his tastes range the spectrum from space opera to the hardest of hard SF. He's always looking to expand those tastes, and reckons that the SF magazines are the perfect place to do just that. He likes both novels and short fiction, but prefers the shorter forms.