Another one of those books that I've been reading forever and finally finished. I have to admit I expected more from it. Maybe it's just me being absolutely saturated with left-wing thinking on the subject of terrorism, but I didn't find that many of the stories truly thought-provoking. I feel things like the Channel 4 drama Britz dealt with the issues in a much more engaging way. The one story that does stand out for me (possibly because I read it in draft well before it was published) is Charlie Stross's "Minutes of the Labour Party Conference 2016" - that should be compulsory reading for the government. ( )

An anthology created in reaction to Britain's overreaching anti-terror laws that forbid "glorifying terrorism". Some of the stories are quite chilling in the "if this goes on" tradition of science fiction. It includes an excellent bibliography in the back that points out that even such popular works as Star Wars qualify under this nonsensical law. ( )

http://nhw.livejournal.com/826490.html

This is a collection of short stories, mostly sfnal, none of them. Many of them go for standard sfnal riffs of humans occupying alien planets (or vice versa) and the underdog biting back; the most memorable of these for me was "Execution Day", by Marie Brennan. Some take a different tack; I particularly liked Ken MacLeod's piece, "MS Found on a Hard Drive", which assembles various of his musings on the subjects of terrorism and contemporary (or near-future, or recent past) Scottish and Irish politics. Charles Stross has a neat epilogue as well, suggesting that the Labour Party will come to its senses, but not until long after it is too late. A collection worth looking out for on its own literary merits, quite apart from the political point being made.
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