Book Review: EXHALATION by Ted Chiang

Exhalation: Stories by Ted Chiang
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

"The universe began as an enormous breath being held... all my desires and ruminations are no more and no less than eddy currents generated by the gradual exhalation of our universe. And until this great exhalation is finished, my thoughts live on."

This was my second Chiang book! I think I would have enjoyed this collection of short stories more, had I not read the earlier collection ("Stories Of Your Life and Others"), which I thought superior to this one.

EXHALATION is still very enjoyable and educational, though! Reading Ted Chiang is more like being inside various philosophy thought experiments instead of hard core sci-fi material, although the "flavors" of the stories vary. His stories are answers to questions such as "What would the world look like if we had scientific proof that God created us 8,912 years ago?", "What if parrots could speak?", "What if we could speak with our paraselves - ourselves in parallel timelines?" and so on.

In this collection of 8 stories and a novella, I thought there were stories that were "stronger" than the others. The novella ("The Lifecycle of Software Objects") was too long and not as compellingly written as the others, I thought. I had to force myself to plod through it.

But the second story (and the title of the collection) was a gem. The book is worth reading just for the second story alone... a meditation on a civilization of robots that lived - and died - millenia before us. Beautiful, soulful writing!

I thought that the four-pager "What's Expected of Us" was also great! Chiang captured the angst of extreme existentialist despair in so few pages. I think it would be a great reading in Philosophy classes for the discussion on Determinism versus Free Will. Will include it in next year's reading list, for sure.

View all my reviews