I adored Stronger, Faster, and More Beautiful. It was everything my little science fiction heart could want.
Summary
Set in our world, spanning the near to distant futures, Stronger, Faster, and More Beautiful is a novel made up of six interconnected stories that ask how far we will go to remake ourselves into the perfect human specimens, and how hard that will push the definition of “human.”
This extraordinary work explores the amazing possibilities of genetic manipulation and life extension, as well as the ethical quandaries that will arise with these advances. The results range from the heavenly to the monstrous.
Deeply thoughtful, poignant, horrifying, and action-packed, Arwen Elys Dayton’s Stronger, Faster, and More Beautiful is groundbreaking in both form and substance.
Review
(Disclaimer: I received this free book from Netgalley. This has not impacted my review which is unbiased and honest.)
There are so many brilliant things to say about Stronger, Faster, and More Beautiful. While this collection is six separate stories, they are interwoven throughout a common thread. We can appreciate the distance between the stories, as well as the similarities. It never felt disjointed, just like separate parts of this immense gorgeous robotic machine working in harmony. What I adored is how unique this book feels. Everything from the format to the ideas.
Geeking Out
My little nerd heart was geeking out so hard for this book. Because a book where the author thinks about what humanity will be in the future will hook me every time. It’s, hands down, the best thing I love about science fiction. And what I write about when I write my own geeky thesises. I love the questioning of what we will be in the future. Will we be even more than we ever thought?
Stronger, Faster, and More Beautiful asks us just this. It asks us where we will take our stand. What we will define as humanity as we move forwards? As our technology advances so much that we can cure what plagued us, what limited us, what defined us. Where will humanity, as we know it, take its last stand?
Just these lines give me goose bumps. Doesn’t it? Because that’s where our society, our technology, is going. And while we can try to stand in its path, there will always be those who are chasing it, like they chase the sun. If these questions also captivate you, then you’ve found the perfect book.
Overall,
Stronger, Faster, and More Beautiful is about the future of humanity. And what that means to us. What we are willing to do for our concept of humanity. Each story is entrancing as we see a snippet of someone’s life. As they live through their moment in time. We witness the way the technology interacts with their life, shaping their families, their futures. How it changes their definition of possible. Their definitions of science, of religion, of reality, and progress. It is phenomenal writing that challenges our ideas of monstrosity and innocence.
Find Stronger, Faster, and More Beautiful on Goodreads, Amazon, Indiebound & The Book Depository.
This sounds too cool! Just headed over to Netgalley to request it. Thanks for sharing!
YAY! I hope you love it
Yeah it’s an intriguing spin across the evolution of body altering technology.
The idea that America could isolate itself and peacefully continue down a radically different path to the rest of the world is childish. Greed abounds, and others states would come down on the America that is wasting itself on absurd narcissism body alterations. Russia’s platinum miners would be upspecced to soldiers and take all they could.
The end was glib and didn’t really explain what was killing all the altered bodies.