I wasn't blown away by this collection, but it's good."A Pocketful of Dolphins" in particular, I think, will stick with me.

This is a collection of politically-driven fiction stories meant to illustrate how the world could continue to be affected by the policies and ideologies of the current (the Trump) administration and related parties. Thus the stories are written as dystopian futures, with a few more artistic or metaphorical. Some are more literal and others more grotesque. The stories are not about nuance and complication - they are about ideology and its extension. The collection delivers on that promise. As su...

Sadly, an this is just a personal opinion, I found most of these stories to be boring. Yes some have these odd ideas about the future, but many were just a polemic that fit Cat Rambo's view of the current world. She's allowed her opinion, and I'm allowed mine.

This collection, kickstarted last year by the small Parvus Press, sets itself an interesting goal: encompassing the sense of disaster and impending doom that current political and environmental factors evoke (mainly focused on the USA) while also incorporating notes of hope. The result is slightly uneven, as some stories contain little more than a grimly extrapolated premise, but others do shine. Of these, it was the stories with a feeling of historical weight to them which really grabbed me. "M...

Originally published at Reading RealityI picked this up around the same time I received Cory Doctorow’s Radicalized to review for Library Journal. Just from the descriptions, it seemed that these two books either springboarded off the same event, were in dialog with each other, or both. (This is also a giant hint that if this book interests you that one will too!)They’re not exactly in dialog with each other, but they certainly arose out of the same event – the 2016 election. Both are wrapped ar...

I love anthologies. I would agree that this one is filled with bold stories. I won't review each one, but overall I liked them. Like all collections, some are better than others, but this is a solid collection. I didn't know most of the authors, but I'll check out many other their other works. Thanks very much for the opportunity to read the advanced copy!!

Where to start? Cat Rambo hates Donald Trump. It is difficult to see why an anthology editor would use that as a basis for a collection of stories. Her editorializing after each story was quite anoying and unnecessary. Science fiction by its nature is speculative and I have read many stories of a simmilar nature that were not based on the over wrought imagination of Trump haters. I can easily see a book based on 44's presidency with stories such as a depopulated country based on a society that e...

Leaning mostly libertarian politically, I found several of the stories offputting. That said, I have the utmost respect for Cat Rambo, the anthology's editor, and found the stories entertaining, well-written, and thought-provoking. You can't really ask for anything more in such a collection of short fiction.

I honestly thought I would like this book. It had several of my favorite elements: science fiction, diversity, actuality. But I thought it was too much. This is an anthology of 30 authors, but although there is a common ground (we hate Trump), there isn't enough to make a cohesive body of work. I enjoyed some stories more than others, but that is only natural in a comprehensive project with 30 authors. I preferred to read the stories as a stand-alone, over a long stretch of time. On the plus sid...

Speculative fiction collection focused on trends in the US given the 2016 elections. Would have been better without the on-the-nose explanations of what you just read from the editor. Some nice variants, though, including Priya Sridhar’s Mustard Seeds and the Elephant’s Foot, about old myths returning under newer conditions.

I received this collection free from NetGalley. The stories contained within were pretty hit or miss. Some I really enjoyed (All the Good Dogs Have Been Eaten, A Gardener's Guide to the Apocalypse, Free WiFi, A Pocketful of Dolphins) but others not so much. Some of the stories also felt like a loose fit at best for the theme; generic sci-fi stories shoehorned into this collection.

If This Goes On, edited by Cat RamboPublished by Pavrus Press LLCPublication date 05 March, 2019This anthology of 30 science fiction stories is a self-proclaimed rally cry to Americans to stand up against their current administration’s ethics and policies. Though it never mentions Donald Trump by name, it does reference ‘45’, as in the 45th president of the United States, and it is glaringly obvious that the editor feels Trump is a problem. Although I’m not an American, am Canadian and British,

What a warning. Take heed.

Cat Rambo, in her Preface to her anthology IF THIS GOES ON, states, "This project is born of rage and sorrow and hope." She doesn't mention any names or specific developments in current politics, but it's clear she and her contributors aren't happy about the direction of the country under the current administration. Some of the stories anthologized here, she acknowledges, "will despair," but others, she knows, will be "lamps to light the path and show the pitfalls as we continue upwards."The wri...

Collection of shorts based loosely on the future of the U.S. post Trump.Some excellent and some new authors to read more from.

I read this book courtesy of the publisher and NetGalley.Anthologies are tricky, of course, and a “response” anthology trickier than most. And inevitably, any reader will prefer some stories and enjoy others less.I settled in to try and describe what this anthology is about, for those who aren’t sure if it’s for them. It’s not a collection of rants against the current state of politics - there’s some of that, but rarely in a shrill or crude way. The majority of the stories jump off from other co...

If you like to revel in dystopia (I do), check out this collection. Some standouts from a reading perspective: Dead Wings, Mustard Seeds and the Elephant’s Foot, A Gardener’s Guide to the Apocalypse, Three Data Units, Free WiFi. Just scrolling back through them for titles reminded me of their punch, though.

If you like to revel in dystopia (I do), check out this collection. Some standouts from a reading perspective: Dead Wings, Mustard Seeds and the Elephant’s Foot, A Gardener’s Guide to the Apocalypse, Three Data Units, Free WiFi. Just scrolling back through them for titles reminded me of their punch, though.

One-sided. Would’ve been nice to include views of the Right for balance.Besides that, this is my first intro into sci-fi anthologies, and there are a lot of feels here, more-so than your average full-length novel.A good read but held down by the bias.

Gorgeous collection of stories that have made me reflect for days after.Very, very cool.