S. Qiouyi Lu writes and translates between two coasts of the Pacific. Ær work, including fiction, poetry, and essays, has appeared in several award-winning venues. In the Watchful City is ær first novella. You can find out more about S. at ær website or on Twitter.
In the Watchful City by S. Qiouyi Lu
In the Watchful City (2021) is a novel in story form, a structure I’m usually a big fan of, but the stories rarely felt fully developed and in the end they just didn’t coalesce for me into an entirely effective or cohesive whole, though there is a true originality in style and content here.
The setting is the city-state of Ora, which has managed to escape from under the dominating Skyland empire and, in an attempt to keep its residents free and happy, the city uses upgraded humans as “nodes” in an AI-like surveillance network (“the Gleaming”). Some specialized nodes can leap into the bodies of living creatures (though not human ones) and control them in order to intervene when necessary.
Anima is one such node and æ has been happily enacting ær role for some time. Ær regular, contented life, though, is disturbed by the appearance of a fore... Read More
