Remission by Charlie Fish

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Lester Curtis
Long Fiction Editor
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Re: Remission by Charlie Fish

Post by Lester Curtis »

I'm nominating this for a slot in Best Of 2017.

It reminded me a lot of Heinlein, because of the terse writing style, I think. But the emotional content is really intense. This story will give you pause for thought.

Seamlessly executed with a kind of ponderous grace, if that makes sense; further description fails me at the moment, but I can't think of a single thing I'd change.

Thank you, Charlie, and if you have anything else, I'd really like to see it, too.
I was raised by humans. What's your excuse?
Megawatts
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Re: Remission by Charlie Fish

Post by Megawatts »

This story is certainly an epic. Reminds me of the novel Anthony Adverse by Hervey Allen. Throughout the story we get a glimpse of the thoughts and feelings and hopes and desires of a young person venturing out on his own. In this case space for eighteen years. I can’t imagine doing sometime like that, but I get the impression that when he returns he will be well of financially. His thoughts reached out to me sometime, very compelling in their statements, and his feelings I could sense.

For twelve years he doesn’t age—going to and coming back the mining asteroid or planet. His feelings when entering and coming out of suspended animation are told effectively for I could sense his transformation to and from. Good use of sensory input from beginning to end.

The characters were believable and their actions seemed inline with the mission. No character was bland. With a story like this one, the setting could have been an island on Earth like in the story Robinson Crusoe or The Blue Lagoon which depicts the actions of castaways and their struggle to survive. This story depicts a struggle also to survive, yet the characters in this story volunteered, and their struggle was facing an overwhelming and uncertain future with many strange and unforeseeable events possible.

I find it hard to believe that Lucy was expected to wait eighteen years for Archer to return. That expectation is too much to fathom. Yet, the author seems very adept at story telling, and I’m sure he had a purpose in the eighteen year wait. Perhaps that symbolized that the life span in the future will be much longer, and an eighteen year wait is more the norm than it is today. Whatever, it gives good food for thought.

A nice, rather interesting story of the feelings and hopes of those that in the future just might have to face.

I like the use of descriptive adjectives like ‘tepid’ which I never remember seeing before in a story. Throughout the story I liked the word choices and their use.


Nice job!!
Tesla Lives!!!
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