Diverse Energies - Review

Diverse Energies

Book Blurb

“No one can doubt that the wave of the future is not the conquest of the world by a single dogmatic creed but the liberation of the diverse energies of free nations and free men. No one can doubt that cooperation in the pursuit of knowledge must lead to freedom of the mind and freedom of the soul.”
—President John F. Kennedy, from a speech at University of California, March 23, 1962

In a world gone wrong, heroes and villains are not always easy to distinguish and every individual has the ability to contribute something powerful.

In this stunning collection of original and rediscovered stories of tragedy and hope, the stars are a diverse group of students, street kids, good girls, kidnappers, and child laborers pitted against their environments, their governments, differing cultures, and sometimes one another as they seek answers in their dystopian worlds. Take a journey through time from a nuclear nightmare of the past to society’s far future beyond Earth with these eleven stories by masters of speculative fiction. Includes stories by Paolo Bacigalupi, Ursula K. Le Guin, Malinda Lo, Cindy Pon, Daniel H. Wilson, and more.

My Review

I received a copy of this book from NetGalley for an honest review. This is a collection of short stories about dystopian places and culturally diverse people. Each author creates a new world with characters you usually don't see much of in books. Here are a few of the stories i really enjoyed.

Good Girl by Malinda Lo
Kyle is a girl who live in a place where you have to be a pure blood. Mixing of races is not aloud and against the law. The problem is she isn't a pure blood but looks enough like one to pass. When her brother goes missing she heads to the Tunnels where she meets Nix. Nix agrees to help her for a price. As time goes by Kyle begins to fall for Nix which is breaking another law. I enjoyed this story a lot as the world the author create seems like it could happen. The characters stay with you and you want more of the story.

Next Door by Rahul Kanakia
In this world the rich stay hooked up to virtual things and don't even notice when the poor live right in their house along side them. Most of the time infecting the houses with bed bugs. Very neat story about one persons search for a clean place to live and what happens when a rich family does notice them.

Gods of the Dimming Night by Greg Van Eekhout
San Diego hasn't had a summer in three years. It stays winter all the time. When Edward looks for a job he comes across what he thinks may be a dream one. To bad it isn't what it seems. I really like this story as it has Norse mythology as the base of it.

There is a lot more stories in this book these are the ones that stood out the most to me and help give this book a 3. I had high hopes going into this book because I love Distopian books and thought it wold be great with different characters. It fell flat in a lot of stories. Instead of enjoying some of them I was bored or just depressed after reading them. A few like the above ones are what made the book good to me. I liked the story lines, the characters where great and most of the time I wanted more of the stories. I would say this book rates right in the middle for me.

3 out of 5 Bats~Pam