(this is just pure haterade. there’s no valuable analysis going on here, if you liked metroid prime 4, ok! neat. carry on)

it turns out that the only thing worse than chasing a trend that doesn’t really mesh with your franchise is to abandon chasing the trend so late in in development that you end up panicking your way into creating something that meshes even less well.

metroid prime 4 is a total failure on every level except for two:

1. the art design is genuinely wonderful, when it’s allowed to be (i.e. when it’s not being applied to the most boring desert in all of video games)

2. the UI and gameplay mechanics are generally rock-solid, which makes sense considering they’re essentially identical to every other game in this series

otherwise, everything about this game that’s unique or an attempted progression on the prior entries in the series is bad.

the motorcycle is the loudest failure because it’s an open and constant admission of so many other failures. you use it to travel between the actual levels, across a barren and bland desert, occasionally crashing into some green rocks because it’s the closest thing to interaction you’ve had to do outside of holding right-trigger for a couple of minutes. it achieves the aim of a loading-screen elevator, but less efficiently and with more time for you to gawk at the sheer hours of wasted effort until even the gawking feels repetitive.

the other thing the bike does is open doors via abysmally slow stock animations involving a lot of gears and slowly rising platforms. thrilling.

the game’s new set of abilities (sorry, PSYCHIC POWERS) are either cribbed from previous games (but now it’s a PSYCHIC spider ball!) and/or utilized entirely for tedious puzzle-solving and combat. I liked the guided-shot okay until the third time I had to fight the mini-boss that requires you hit three orbiting drones through a wave of other orbiting drones several times in succession in order to be able to do any damage, which puts a lot of strain on the floaty flight controls and camera that they aren’t refined enough to handle.

the story has a theoretically interesting angle (you’re explicitly doing archaeology, the alien species asking for your help is long dead) except it’s just a variation on a thing every metroid game is doing, and the execution here is remarkably bland and over-reliant on the samus-as-holy-savior stuff that always feels like a bummer when it comes up too much in any given metroid.

but also we have NPCs!

oh christ the NPCs. nothing tells you how fucked this game’s development was than the moments when mackenzie won’t shut the fuck up about how you need to get to the lava world now that you have the lava wheels on your bike, multiple times, as you drive your bike in a straight line directly towards the lava world. thank you video game for repeatedly yelling at me about your own failures of level and world design.

metroid prime 4 is the most scared game I’ve played in a while. the game is absolutely terrified that you’re going to feel potentially lost, miss a turn, stop doing the next thing on the checklist (there’s only the one checklist). your shithead NPC companion will never leave you alone. he’s not physically present as much as the opening moments might make you fear, but he’s still always barking at you.

when he isn’t, it’s because the game has you going down a straight corridor towards another straight corridor, and so it can breathe a sigh of relief knowing you won’t have any dangerous pretensions about choice or exploration.

the favored level design here is “walk through a linear series of rooms while the lights are off, get to the place where you turn the lights on, then walk backwards through that same linear series of rooms, but now the lights are on and probably some bad guys woke up!” the game puts a dot on your minimap when you enter a zone that shows you where the area boss fight’s gonna happen, and then there is virtually no need to ever open your map again because there is no branching or maze-like behavior at all (except in very short bursts that always, always wind back on themselves in the simplest possible fashion).

going back to the NPCs for my last big complaint: all these idiots talking to samus makes the decision to have samus be mute extremely weird. it’s not weird in, say, metroid prime 1 or super metroid, because in those cases samus is exploring a hostile alien world by herself and has no need to be talking to anyone. in a game where she is interacting with someone a lot — metroid fusion — it’s also fine because she does talk because samus isn’t a fucking mime, she’s not doomguy, she’s just a bounty hunter who usually operates solo!

if you didn’t want to give her a voice actress and risk people being annoying about it or comparing it too directly to other m, there’s a simple enough solution there: get rid of the fucking NPCs, or at least avoid having them do stock-video-game conversations about where the objective is and what it looks like. having samus do mario-RPG-ass pantomime in these sequences is absurd and does the opposite of what metroid games usually do, which is use her relative silence as a way to reduce the friction between player and situation.

that this game doesn’t suck to play on a moment-to-moment level only exacerbates its failures, to my mind. the scaffolding for even a “pretty good” game was already here, it’s called the metroid prime trilogy, you get zero points for that stuff still being here and you certainly don’t get points for the stuff you tried to add. so if we’re doing the math, that’s going to be zero points overall. congratulations.

(I think the new suit sucks too, but now we’re just being petty. wouldn’t want to be petty)

As writers, we collect, save, and apply information. So much so, we end up with physical and online clutter. Bookmarks are a great example.

If I go by Pareto principle (correct me if I’m wrong), about 20% of all the websites I save are the ones I go to all the time. And about 80% are those I’ve been there once and never come back. I’m a pack rat and deleting unused bookmarks can be painful.

I can’t believe how many bookmarks I’ve saved throughout the years. Many have broken links and there are websites I wonder why I saved them in the first place. I might as well take screenshots of the information on my phone and go back to them when I need them.

Anyway, I feel so much better deleting all the bookmarks I don’t need. One less thing to worry about (until I start collecting more).

#bookmark #cleaning

# AVISO: USO DE IA NO TEXTO #

Imagine um país em que, para dirigir um carro, não fosse necessário fazer prova no DETRAN.

Bastaria se matricular em uma autoescola qualquer, assistir às aulas — boas ou péssimas — cumprir presença e, ao final, sair habilitado a dirigir um caminhão de 8 eixos em via pública.

Soa absurdo?

Pois é exatamente assim que funciona a formação médica no Brasil hoje.

Um diploma que não garante competência

No modelo atual, concluir o curso de Medicina é suficiente para exercer a profissão.

Não há, após a graduação, nenhum exame nacional obrigatório que comprove se aquele recém-formado domina o mínimo necessário para cuidar de vidas humanas.

O diploma virou, na prática, um atestado de frequência — não de competência.

E isso não seria tão grave se todas as faculdades formassem médicos bem preparados.

Mas esse definitivamente não é o caso.

A explosão de faculdades e o colapso da formação prática

Nos últimos anos, o Brasil assistiu à abertura desenfreada de cursos de Medicina.

Muitos deles surgem sem estrutura adequada, sem hospital próprio, sem campo de prática suficiente e, em alguns casos, sem nem fazer convênios sólidos para garantir treinamento clínico real.

As ações judiciais

Há situações em que decisões judiciais autorizam cursos mesmo quando os requisitos mínimos não estão plenamente atendidos. O resultado é previsível: alunos se formam sem ter atendido pacientes em volume e complexidade suficientes para desenvolver raciocínio clínico seguro

O sistema finge que ensinou.

O diploma finge que certificou.

E a população paga o preço.

ENAMED: uma boa ideia… com o objetivo errado

Diante desse cenário, o governo criou o ENAMED. À primeira vista, parece um avanço. Afinal, trata-se de uma prova nacional aplicada aos formandos em Medicina.

Mas o problema está no detalhe — e ele é enorme.

O ENAMED não é um exame de habilitação profissional.

Ele funciona apenas como um instrumento de ranqueamento.

Na prática:

• A nota serve para disputar vagas de residência médica;

• Quem vai mal não sofre nenhuma consequência profissional;

• Quem não faz a prova continua apto a trabalhar normalmente;

• O diploma, sozinho, continua autorizando o exercício da Medicina.

Ou seja: a prova existe, mas não protege o paciente.

O que a Medicina brasileira realmente precisa é de um Exame de Proficiência Médica — um filtro nacional, obrigatório, objetivo e inegociável.

Algo simples no conceito, mas poderoso no efeito:

Só pode exercer Medicina quem provar que sabe o mínimo necessário para fazê-lo com segurança.

Esse exame teria três funções centrais.

1. Proteger o paciente

Antes de qualquer debate corporativo, ideológico ou político, a prioridade deveria ser óbvia: evitar que pessoas despreparadas atendam a população.

2. Responsabilizar as faculdades

Se uma faculdade formar dezenas de alunos e nenhum passar no exame, a conclusão será inevitável: o curso é ruim. E curso ruim não deve continuar funcionando.

3. Parar de culpar apenas o aluno

O discurso atual é confortável para o Estado:

“Se o aluno não sabe, a culpa é dele.”

O próprio governo autoriza a abertura das faculdades.

Se existe um título profissional que permite atuar sobre a vida de terceiros, o Estado tem a obrigação de garantir que esse título signifique algo concreto.

Cada coisa no seu lugar

O problema central da Medicina no Brasil hoje é a confusão de funções.

• Universidade serve para ensinar

• Prova de Proficiência serve para autorizar o exercício profissional.

• Residência médica serve para formar especialistas.

Hoje, o país mistura tudo:

• Usa uma prova como ranking,

• Trata especialização como filtro de qualidade,

• E deixa o exercício básico da profissão sem nenhum controle real.

O resultado é um sistema frouxo, incoerente e perigoso.

Medicina não é presença em sala de aula.

E muito menos um experimento social feito às custas da população mais vulnerável.

Se advogados precisam provar que sabem advogar antes de trabalhar, é indefensável que médicos não precisem provar que sabem cuidar de vidas.

Chegou a hora de parar de fingir que o problema não existe.

De parar de proteger instituições ruins.

E de exigir, com todas as letras:

Só deve atender a população quem provar, de forma objetiva, que sabe o mínimo necessário para ser médico.

Qualquer coisa diferente disso não é descuido: É irresponsabilidade institucional.

#blog

I have these fleeting thoughts constantly. How to say it. What to say. When to say. Should I put it on Reddit? Should I weave it into a story? Is it even worth telling anyone? So I figured I would just put here here on my page as a silent post for anyone curious to read.

Sometimes when I get heavy thoughts, I don’t think my life is worth anything. Before you go all in and think “oh someone needs to call someone” or “get therapy” then you truly don’t align with my wishes or mindset. You have things. You have a support system. You have community. You have something to integrate into.

My mental state socially is just totally wrecked. The unspoken cracks of post divorce male depression are probably widely documented but once you live it and experience it, it just hits hard. Daily, I deal with thoughts of what if or dreams of connections or just going into a world that is not cold or hostile or draining.

I live my life outside of my home in transactions. “Give money for xyz, pay for this, get this, work for someone” – I rarely see the world outside my home as something meaningful or even enriching. I see stress. I see a source of anxiety. I don’t see an happy ending.

In this void of negative thoughts, create. I world build. I go to totally different places in my mind when I write my stories. I try to escape without ending things.

Right now, my cat is looking out the window. A house cat. A silent cat. A strange cat. But she says the most profound things in her communication. She just wants me breathing. Pets, Cuddles, Playtime, food. – I am her world. I have other living creatures too. They depend on me as well. My mom is still alive. I have anchors to keep me here for now.

Outlive my mom, Outlive my pets, Then decide if I want to take a nap. I’m so tired.

If you read this, thanks for acknowledging I exist. I’ll be ok. No plans to nap right now.

Human I am hungry My food dish is not full Fill it so I may eat

Thank you, Human

Human I am thirsty My tiny fountain is not sufficient Turn on the big one so I may drink

Thank you, Human

Human You are dirty I do not care about your cleaning rituals Hold still so I may clean you

Thank you, Human

Human You are sad I will lay on you until you feel better Stay there so I may take care of you

Thank you, Human

#Poetry #RileyPoem #Kindness

drafts 003 – january bullets

it's sometimes hard to collect all the thoughts i have and synthesize them in singular essay. as such, i started collected the random thoughts i have throughout the day. here's a couple from last month:

• not to sound like every 25 year old ever but i’ve been thinking a lot about neuroplasticity. it’s pretty rare that i lose my train of thought while i speak as i’ve always tried my best to be exact with language, even as a kid. it was to the point where i wouldn’t event start essays in my 8th grade languages arts class since i needed my introduction to be perfect. and ngl, this kinda followed me into adulthood as i get into writing consistently as a hobby, evidenced by my countless essays drafts i furiously wrote in a dream-like haze after reading for more than like ten minutes. i feel like there’s a metaphor there if you squint hard enough. i mostly find myself lacking the words in the middle of work meetings, looking to the side of the screen trying to connect the cerebral dots in my brain back again, making eye contact with megan on my katesye poster that is blue tacked above my desk.
• my apartment is a two minute walk from a harris teeter (this is giving context i swear) and i wear the whole most horrific outfits of my life in there—like i know it dad would side eye me if i was stranger. it’s mostly bc that short of a walk doesn’t necessitate a full “outfit” to be worn. and by “outfit” i mean putting on jeans and a t-shirt i guess? it’s not like putting on those articles of clothing takes a ton of effort, but why do i need to try that hard before 9 AM. anyway, it makes me eternally grateful i don’t live by any of my coworkers. i would be absolutely stunned if i saw my manager saw me in the dairy aisle (she might be lactose intolerant idk her tea), staring directly at the banana socks i stole from my bf peeking through my all-black birkenstocks. that fr just sent a chill down my spine.
• i’m being dead serious when i say this but why don’t more people use vsco?
• ok this year i really need to learn spanish. not only because i have moots in south america (#iykyk), but because i simply can’t believe there are white people out there living in china speaking the language near perfectly with the people at food stands. like if they can do that, i should be able to order at a dominican restaurant without sounding like a toddler.
• i’ve been obsessed with watching recaps of niche internet drama on youtube for the past couple of weeks now. the sheer volume of videos is so baffling to me as there’s countless beefs between creators i’ve never heard of that sometimes lasts months on end? like there’s feuds between those influencers you only see in those reels your gen x mom sends you. they’re truly living in a different reality and i applaud those youtubers for putting in the time to chronicle these events to me while i sit in my bed… sometimes high. why do i know what podcast ash trevino went on (sitting with her kids mind you) after she received allegations of not giving said kids a bed to sleep on? why do i also know that the host of that podcast recently released a course on “how to be an influencer” with an application that didn’t need any social media handles? let me stop.
• i don’t know why i always scrape by surviving january. every year, without fail, i find myself counting down the days to february 1st. i think it started in high school when i was waiting on college app decisions for what felt like an eternity, desperately trying to be validated for the countless hours i spent studying for ap exams. it all felt like a blur. somehow simultaneously comforting yet foreboding? i just remember being really scared. it’s a new year of my life and it’s up to me to carve a path for myself and i'm like what? 17? how can i be trusted to make my own choices, let alone a dream to chase. maybe that is reserved for someone else. i don’t think i’ve ever shaken off that feeling and it’s kinda metastasizing in my psyche, praying to get found out.
• trixie mattel is rupaul’s successor
• i’ve been listening to my playlist from 2019 and i think south florida was patient 0 for that gen z aesthetic everyone posts on their pinterest boards. i get the association with la and emma chamberlain and that side of the internet plastered with video thumbnails of rex orange county refracted by the discoloration of a jakarta filter—however comma—i think broward county is the real inspo. do you even know who traithalon is? right…

20 January 2026

Starlight Way (working title): I've wanted to make an all-white painting for a while and have failed at past attempts, but it seems I may have finally found a way into one. Which in my head felt something like approaching the painting as a white Conté crayon drawing on toned paper. The nucleus of the image is based off of a 9 meter sculpture of a scaled model Qatar Airways Boeing 777-9 aircraft around Heathrow Terminal 4 near Starlight Way. The painting doesn't reflect that specific location visually, so there's maybe an angle in tying it to it through the title, but that may change. Think it will actually, doesn't need that. Maybe just Plane is better...it is. Anyway, the important part is what the paint is doing. The explorations of space, value, line, and yes—plane—that emerged. I think I can trace those elements back to two works I looked at a lot this week:

Phoebe Helander, Wire Form III (Divided Space) (2026) David Ostrowski, F (Jung, Brutal, Gutaussehend) (2012)

Each of these paintings address space/the picture plane/gravity/color in interesting ways, and while it's unwise to reach for these effects intentionally, I do think what subconsciously drew me to portraying the sculpture was related to these concerns via its position as an object unmooring from the ground while remaining fixed to it. And I think what resulted sits at the center of an axis that acknowledges multiple potential trains of thought without committing fully to any of them—emerging from/being pulled back into a place of origin, crossing/being stuck at a horizon, taking off/crashing, dissecting space/being absorbed by space, and additive line/subtractive line.

18 January 2026

Walked along the perimeter of the Walthamstow Wetlands on a path lined by a high sloping grassy bank/berm. Its crest sat in my sight just at the height of some of the taller buildings across the reservoir in Tottenham. Lots of ducks waddling around at the crest, which made for a fun effect—like they were using the tops of the buildings as stepping stones for their webbed feet. They may have actually been geese or some sort of geese hybrids, necks were pretty long. Maybe Canada Geese. In any case, it was gray paved path, big soft wall of dull green/yellow, wet black feet on buildings, gray-brown feathers, and gray-blue sky. To mind: Frank Walter: Untitled (1988, a green/blue/white/beige landscape), Richard Diebenkorn: Bridge (1961), Alex Katz: Untitled (Dog On The Beach) (2002). Flat wall waves of color. Compressed, stacked, arranged, brought forward. As I was walking, one duck/goose followed me for a couple minutes. It would waddle ahead of my gait, swivel its head to stare at me as I passed, and then waddle further ahead of me again. Until it stopped to snack on some grass, at which point it was no longer interested in me.

昨日の自分は、体が割れそうだった。 ひび割れた自分の体から、過去の断片的な記憶が漂い始める。

机の上のものがどれも動かせなくなる時、それは新しいことを始めようとしていて、最初から手法を間違えていたのだ、と気づく瞬間がある。 このような時、そのような光景だけが、頭の中にぼんやりあり、実際にそこに置いてあった物体は白く塗り潰されていてよく思い出せない。 どのネジだったのかも分からない細かいパーツは、すべてポリ袋にまとめられ、自分が捨てたのではなく、勝手に処理されたものとして脳が判断する。

缶でも箱でも、そこにあればとりあえずそれを振ってみる、という自分は、もうとっくにいないのかもしれないと思った。 そもそも、振るべき缶や箱が目の前にない。 家にある箱はすべて、自分で買ってきて、自分で何かを入れたものばかりだ。 子どもの頃に目の前にあった箱は、文脈の分からない容器だったばっかりに、大きく振る事で、その存在を自分に近づけさせていた。

そうして、缶を振っていると、友人が少し遠くに見えてくる。 缶を振っていて、自分が学校へ向かっていることには気づいていなかった。 少し走れば追いつけるし、話したいこともきっとあったはずなのに、理由を並べても、俺は走らない。 歩く速度を変えないまま会えず、それでも話しかけるときの第一声だけは無意識に考えていて、結局その言葉は使われないまま、その文章はただ消失した。

そんな事を繰り返しただけ、ただ体だけが大人になっていく。 大学生になった自分は、英語に興味はないかと言ってきた大人に誘われて、特徴が全くない灰色のビルに入った。 何もテナントのない階で、シャツのおじさんが降りていったことだけは覚えている。 磁場が下から上へと体を走り抜けたとき、さっきの降りた階で、おじさんが自分のためだけになる何かをしたのだと思った。

目的もないまま家に帰った記憶もなく、次の場面では自分はパソコンを触っている。 目が乾くというのは、劇的な出来事からはほど遠いサインのひとつで、本当に一日中パソコンを眺めていただけだったのだと脳が決定づけた。

ポップな色合いの民族ラグの上にガラクタを置いておくと、元々持っていないはずなのに、高級な電子音楽機器を盗まれたような感覚がして、どこか寂しかった。 代わりにおもちゃのお金でも置かれていれば、それは目で楽しむエレクトロニカとして処理されて、星と星とが衝突したかと思えば、クレヨンで描かれた火花が体裁を保っていただろう。

料理実習で、授業の終わりに、人がある程度いるにも関わらず、部屋の6割ほどが大きな空洞を占めていた。 大きく空いたスペースは、これまでの人の会話をすべて吸収するような形で、お別れを静かに開催していた。 誰かが何かをしている、音が反響する関係で、そんな事しか分からなかった。

鳥を飼っていれば、飼い始めた当初のことは多分思い出せない。 自分とは別の、ただ色違いの自分みたいなやつが飼っている鳥なのだと、どこかで無意識に考えている。 お金に反射した光が当たれば、色違いの自分は消える、そんな感覚であり、隣町を見れば、いつも厚い層の雨雲でいっぱいだった。

ご飯が炊ける音がして、電源ボタンを連続で2回押された気がした。 豆腐を使えば味噌汁が二杯もできてしまうが、おかずが貧相なので困らない。

明日には体がボンドでくっついて、全て元に戻る事を祈る。

We got the keys to the house, and it’s both amazing but also super overwhelming. There’s so much shit to be done, but I’m happy.

sure come over let's roll a joint and chill you can spread yourself over the couch pillows sure come over we can dream with eyes wide open and I can stare at you for hours while you breathe the air from my nose holding that trembling pause that sits between the lips to lips and we both feel that stupid organic electricity so much so that now you need to distract and start counting my freckles I hate when you do that until you try to connect the dots in the hope of revealing the image of some mythological being perhaps finding a map of a submerged treasure but all you will find and believe me when I say this all you will find are some random shapes that do not provide you any clues do not point out any directions it only says yes I am here.

/oc25

become the orgasm you are.

/jan 26

I sleep with myself, lying in fetal position I sleep with myself, spooning my soul I sleep with myself. I sleep with myself hugging myself, there's no night so long I do not sleep with myself. like a troubadour holding his lute I sleep with myself. under a starry night I sleep with myself, while others are born or die or have birthdays I sleep with myself. sometimes I fall asleep with myself still wearing my reading glasses. but even in the dark I know I am sleeping with myself. and whoever wants to sleep with me, will have to sleep by my side.

/dec 25

Freundinnen & Freunde der Weisheit! Ein neuer Monat hat begonnen und der Newsletter erscheint bereits in der fünften Ausgabe. Heute zeige ich auf, warum Tagträumen alles andere als nutzlos ist.

Tagträumen galt lange als unproduktives Abschweifen. Neue neurowissenschaftliche Studien zeigen jedoch, dass genau dieses mentale Umherschweifen dem Gehirn hilft, zu lernen und kreative Verbindungen zu knüpfen. Dahinter stehen drei unterschiedliche Arten der Neugier: epistemische Neugier, die nach neuem Wissen strebt; divergente Neugier, die spielerisch nach Möglichkeiten sucht; und affektive Neugier, die emotionale Reize verarbeitet. Während Mäuse im Labor frühere Reize „vorausschauend“ erneut aktivierten, zeigte sich beim Menschen, dass stille Wachphasen das Gedächtnis stärken und kreatives Denken fördern.

Diese Formen der Neugier zeigen sich besonders dann, wenn der Geist nicht gezielt gelenkt wird: beim Duschen, Spazieren oder bei monotonen Aufgaben. In solchen Momenten wird das sogenannte „Default Mode Network“ aktiv – ein Hirnnetzwerk, das Erinnerungen aufruft, Zukünftiges durchspielt und neue Lösungswege simuliert. Wer also scheinbar abschweift, ist oft in einem kognitiven Zustand erhöhter Verbindungskraft zwischen Planung, Erinnerung und Vorstellung – ein perfektes Umfeld für Ideenentwicklung.

Auch im Alltag zeigt sich die Wirkung: Menschen, die bewusst kurze Denkpausen einlegen, tolerieren Schmerz besser, reduzieren Stresshormone und lösen Probleme kreativer. Firmen, die „mind-wander breaks“ einführen, berichten von effizienteren Meetings. Statt das Abschweifen zu bekämpfen, lohnt es sich, es gezielt zuzulassen – als stillen Motor für Lernen, Kreativität und emotionale Balance.

Denkanstoss zum Wochenbeginn

„Das ganze Ungluück der Menschen nährt sich aus einem einzigen Umstand, nämlich, dass sie nicht ruhig in einem Zimmer bleiben können.“ – Blaise Pascal (1623–1662)

ProductivityPorn-Tipp der Woche: Zwei-Minuten-Regel

Wenn eine Aufgabe weniger als zwei Minuten dauert, erledige sie sofort. Das verhindert, dass kleine To-dos sich zu einem riesigen Berg aufstauen und spart dir Zeit beim späteren Nacharbeiten.

Aus dem Archiv: Sind Eulen die schlaueren Köpfe?

Hast du dich jemals gefragt, ob es einen Zusammenhang zwischen deiner bevorzugten Tageszeit und deiner geistigen Leistungsfähigkeit gibt? Neue Forschungsergebnisse legen nahe, dass „Eulen“, also Menschen, die nachts aktiv sind und spät schlafen gehen, in kognitiven Tests tendenziell besser abschneiden als „Lerchen“, die früh aufstehen und morgens am produktivsten sind.

weiterlesen …

Vielen Dank, dass Du Dir die Zeit genommen hast, diesen Newsletter zu lesen. Ich hoffe, die Inhalte konnten Dich inspirieren und Dir wertvolle Impulse für Dein (digitales) Leben geben. Bleib neugierig und hinterfrage, was Dir begegnet!

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EpicMind – Weisheiten für das digitale Leben „EpicMind“ (kurz für „Epicurean Mindset“) ist mein Blog und Newsletter, der sich den Themen Lernen, Produktivität, Selbstmanagement und Technologie widmet – alles gewürzt mit einer Prise Philosophie.

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Topic #Newsletter

195 pages Edited by Susan Kaye Quinn (2024)

Read this if you like: Solarpunk, short speculative fiction, inventive worldbuilding

tl;dr summary: Collection of shorts that each imagine a hopeful future in a different way

See the book on Bookshop 

One of the coolest things about science fiction is its capacity to inspire actual change in the real world by showing people what's possible. There are plenty of examples of technology imagined in the pages of a novel and later created in a physical form. And it can have a similar impact on how people think and view the world. This is one of the reasons I've been getting more into solarpunk. It's an antidote for that overwhelmed hopelessness that sets in when I think about climate change and how incredibly fucked the planet is. Stories might not be able to solve the whole problem, but I like reading about one potential way that we could sidestep disaster (or at least be okay, still, after the disaster happens). I also feel a smidge of hope knowing that someone has put a solution out into the world that, just maybe, someone else can run with to make some aspect of reality just a little bit better.

All of the stories in this collection nailed that spirit of solarpunk. There are elements of nearly every story that are depressing or downright terrifying on their own: a flooded future Rio de Janeiro; a derelict space station populated by giant centipedes; an invisible beast trapped behind a city fence. But these potential downers serve as jumping off points for very hopeful narratives, and that ability to find the points of light hidden inside something very dark is really what's so magical about solarpunk in general for me.

Getting a bit more specific with this collection, I found the worldbuilding to be on point across the stories. They were consistently able to ground the reader in a very vivid setting without bogging it down with tons of description. ”The Doglady and the Rainstorm” especially is a perfect example of how using the right specific details can build an entire world in just a few paragraphs. The opening image is the main character, Joseane, boating down a street-turned-canal between vertical gardens, accompanied by the buzz of pollinator drones. By the second page, I'm fully anchored in a place and can place it roughly in the semi-near future, and I'm ready to move with Joseane through this world. 

“Centipede Station” is another one where the worldbuilding is on-point and accomplished very quickly through choice descriptions (it also just might be my favorite, though that's a hard choice because all of the stories have their strong points). In the first two paragraphs, we understand both that Pebble and Moss are on a space station, and that we're dealing with something more organic than what you might expect from that setting. It's not easy to both establish and subvert a reader's expectations that quickly without giving them whiplash. It's accomplished here by keeping the language straightforward and the characters central. It doesn't start with a zoomed-out view of the station—it starts with two characters huddled around a campfire, then extends outward to the centipedes chittering in the dark, then finally hovers over them to show the context. 

Something else I enjoyed about both of these stories is how they defied reader expectations. I've read stories set in flooded cities before, but never one that focuses on a dogwalker as a protagonist like “The Doglady and the Rainstorm” does. Telling the story through that unexpected perspective, and then adding in the surprise wrinkle that she has a paralyzing fear of rainstorms, makes the familiar trope feel completely new. With “Centipede Station” I was able to see the ending coming from fairly early on, but in that “I feel smart” way, not a way that kills the tension. Instead, it shifts the tension, away from a fear of the centipedes and the environment and more toward the other layers, like how the characters are dealing with their grief while navigating this alien landscape. 

As a cryptid fanatic, “What Kind of Bat Is This?” was pretty much written for me to love it. It has a somewhat familiar setup: a scientist, Bree, accidentally falls into an unsearched cave and in the process stumbles across a long-hidden form of life. What I like is how this premise is balanced against Bree's relationship with Izzy, a former colleague. The emotional arc isn't just the combination of fear and excitement associated with discovering a new species, but also Bree's complicated relationship with Izzy, and the way it sours what should otherwise be an incredible discovery. I also like the way it comes around at the end, with the ultimate conclusion being one of sharing the joy and working together, which is a spirit I think is central to the idea of solarpunk in general. 

When it comes to which stories in the collection I think have the most helpful and in-the-moment beneficial message, “A Merger in Corn Country” tops that list, I think. The premise of this one, in brief, is that a sustainable commune buys the farm next to an old, set-in-his-ways corn farmer. And spoiler: it doesn't veer into the obvious conflict you'd expect from that set-up. Instead, it's generally a warm-fuzzy feel-good romp, and I enjoyed every minute of it. The voice really helped with this. It's charming and folksy without veering into caricature. There isn't a ton of conflict or tension in the story—but in this case, I feel like that's the point. In a way, the reader’s expectations generate the main tension. I, at least, just kept waiting for the other shoe to drop and for there to be some big fight and falling out between Dennis and the commune, and I was glad to be proven wrong and have the story go a different direction. 

“The Park of the Beast” has the darkest, most ominous feel of all of them. At first, I would say there's a more dystopian vibe to the caged-off substation than the utopian world most of the stories inhabit. But there's a quirkiness to the voice that lightens it, pushing it more toward absurdism than horror. The beast is frightful, but described in a way that makes it feel like something to root for more than something to fear. Maybe I'm reading into this, but it felt to me like the narrator was eager for the day the beast would break free of its cage, like it would be the force that freed all of them from a larger fear. I liked that inversion of the expected, and that's what kept it feeling like it belonged in this collection.

I think it's fitting that  “The Park of the Beast” comes after “Ancestors, Descendants” because it's another one that starts off feeling more dystopian. It opens on the protagonist alone in his town after the rest of its inhabitants abandoned it; when he does find more people, they're not exactly friendly. This turns in the second half, though, and ultimately the arc is one of finding strength in community. From a craft standpoint, I was impressed by how “Ancestors, Descendants” covered such a broad span of time and still gave the reader characters to care about. It's written as a kind of diptych of flash pieces, each with its own arc. That's an unusual format but one that works for this story because it keeps the characters completely separate in the reader's mind, and lets them fully sink into each world and get to stay with each character for a whole stretch.

“Coriander” feels like an excellent anchor for the collection for multiple reasons. For one, I like the symmetry of starting and ending with flooded worlds. In the case of “Coriander”, that world is the city where her great-grandmother (her ah-zho) grew up. The narrator is there to connect with her lineage, and that mission also puts the story in conversation with “Ancestors, Descendants.”

I often focus on the individual stories in a collection, but the overall reading experience is important, too, and Bright Green Futures does an excellent job in that regard. The variety of settings and voices keeps each story feeling fresh, but they have enough of a thematic thread running through them that they feel like they all belong together. I'd definitely give this collection a strong recommend for anyone who wants to dig deeper into the solarpunk genre. 

 

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#BookReviews #ShortStory #Solarpunk #SciFi #WorldBuilding