Sex and Violence in Zero-G: The Complete "Near Space" Stories, Expanded Edition

by Allen Steele

Paperback, 2012

Status

Available

Call number

813.54

Series

Near Space (short stories)

Genres

Science Fiction

Fiction

Publication

Fantastic Books (2012), Paperback, 514 pages

Description

All the stories of Allen Steele's award-winning "Near Space" series--now in an expanded and revised second edition Since its first publication in 1999, Sex and Violence in Zero-G has become one of the most long-sought and hard-to-find of Steele's books. At last, this massive collection is back in print--complete with a new introduction, five additional stories, and a revised timeline. Includes the Hugo Award-winning novella "The Death of Captain Future" and the Hugo Award-winning novelette "The Emperor of Mars." Reviews: ...the Near Space series "presents a realistic and action-packed modern vision of the industrialization of space and those who make it happen. If the collective governments of the world had any sense, they'd be using these books as texts for ushering in a future worth having." --Analog Science Fiction and Fact "Sex and Violence in Zero-G collects some important work by an author who has become one of the finer hard science fiction writers around... definitely a worthwhile collection." --Sci-Fi Weekly (A-) "Steele's stories strive for a welcome verisimilitude, and how things might work in an environment that actively works against that sort of thing. And it works. Put ordinary people into a harsh, hostile environment, do bad things to them and then watch how they deal with it. It's a winning combination, especially as written by Allen Steele." --Tangent Online "For those of you unfortunate enough to have not yet discovered Allen Steele, this collection of short stories is the perfect place to start." --Explorations… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member Magentawolf

This is a review for the LibraryThing Early Reviewers program; the book arrived as an uncorrected galley in PDF format. It was not originally indicated as an unproofed copy; I had to contact the publisher for confirmation.

'Uncorrected' being the operative word here, I gave up counting after finding

some twenty glaring errors in spelling and word choice in the first 30 pages (stories which were previously published, mind you!) of the collection.

Containing twenty stories set in a plausible near future, this collection is chronologically ordered from our first return to space up until the settlement of the inner solar system. In general, an enjoyable series with enough variation in setting and theme to keep it fresh throughout the collection. I'll be looking forward to adding an error-free version to my library.

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LibraryThing member media-junkie

Thanks to the Kindle reading bar I can tell you that I was 15% deep in this anthology before I read a story I enjoyed, 25% deep before a woman had more than two lines, and 36% deep in the book when the unrelenting melancholy made me ask why I was doing this to myself and stop.

Based on the title I

was hoping for Pulp Fiction in space, but it was not to be. Despite the title I did not find any sex scenes or romantic scenes in that 36%. There was mention that sex had occurred in the past but no description aside from it happened (for the gay couple) or it was non-consensual (for the rude pushy het woman). There wasn't much violence until 28%, but then it set in heavily.

Two caveats: 1] For all I know things got a lot better after 36% and 2] Allen Steele like Harry Turtledove might just be an author that appeals to the male audience a lot more than the female.

Note to the publisher: This e-book was riddled with understandable typos (bog vs. bag) inexcusable typos (hte vs. the) and sentences clearly missing one or more words. Even in a book I really enjoyed that would have been enough to irk me. If you can't invest the money in a proof-reader please at least employ a spell checker.

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LibraryThing member MorHavok

Pleasantly surprised, that's what I am. Generally I'm not a fan of short stories, but wow these ones hooked me. These stories realize a possible future, in which mankind accepts its destiny as a space faring species. As expected with any good short stories I was sad that many of them ended. This

book had several advantages that many short stories don't. First the stories all take place in the same universe, and are in chronological order. This created a book that even with all short stories, the continuity worked well, and the reader did not feel like they were diving into a new book every chapter. It also explored many ideas and possible futures that I related with well. Fun book, fun stories, wish there were expanded versions!

P.S. Sadly the typos took away from the book sometimes, but they were not as overwhelming as I have seen in some other ebooks. I am not sure why ebooks have such bad editing as they are generally not even spell checked it seems like, and have horrible formatting. Oh well.

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LibraryThing member Surtac

I hadn’t read much of Steele’s other work before reading this collection – the three Coyote novels and the Hugo novelette from last year (which is in this book, btw) – so I didn’t really know what to expect.

I was pleasantly surprised. It’s a series of stories presented in chronological

order as they ‘happened’ within Steele’s near future history concerning the development of a space industry and the exploration of the Moon, Mars and the Asteroid belts, leading to the establishment of separate political entities in those places and their eventual conflict with Earth.

Most of the stories are pretty good – they held my attention and kept me reading, despite it being a PDF format ARC that I had to read on the PC, not my Kindle.

Some were reminiscent of Larry Niven’s Belter stories, others felt more like some of the near future stuff from Jerry Pournelle and Ben Bova from the 1980s. So if you remember and liked those, you’ll likely be happy with this collection also.

I found it to be a strong, solid collection.

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LibraryThing member Guide2

A collection of short Near Space stories. A bit uneven with some stories only mildly interesting (mostly in the first section of the book) and some other very enjoyable, including Captain Future. The PDF of the eBook was full of typos and missing letters unfortunately and it was somewhat difficult

to read because of the fixed formatting.

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LibraryThing member sdobie

A collection of all the short fiction in Steele's history of the beginnings of human colonization of the solar system. These stories were originally published starting in the late 1980's, so a lot of the earlier stories do feel dated with mentions of people in the 2020's dealing with the Soviet

Union and listening to CD's. The timeline is also very optimistic with heavy space industrialization and moon missions happening around 2010. The stories set later in time were generally more interesting since they felt less dated and were mostly written later as Steele became a better writer.

The main problem with the stories is that they are almost all done in the style of someone retelling a story from the past in an almost journalistic fashion, so there is really no suspense or character development, just a straightforward retelling of what happened. What is interesting in most of the stories is the non-glamourous view of what life in space could really be like for the ordinary people trying to work there.

My favorite stories in the collection were probably the two Captain Future stories and "The Emperor of Mars".

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LibraryThing member ladyoflorien

I loved the science fiction stories in 'Sex and Violence in Zero-G: The Complete "Near Space" Stories, Expanded...' by Allen Steele. If you are in the mood to read some short stories, I recommend this book.

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