Time traveling fakers meeting up with the real thing, werewolves, and vampires and zombie and fairies (oh my), being haunted by your own ghost, cryogenic false promises.

All of this and so much more is in Charlie Jane Anders' book of short stories. I got this from Netgalley as an early release. I try really hard to read these Netgalley things as soon as I get them, but I just couldn't with this. Don't get me wrong, I loved every story, that 5 stars is no lie. But, once I finished a story I like to sit with it. Think about the what ifs, and the where did they gos. And jump into another author's world. There are a ton of stories here, so it took me a while to get through it all. I enjoyed the trip all of the way through.

The sort of stories in this collection really ran the gamut. Outrageously fun space opera? Check. Horrific body horror with toxic relationships? Some of that, too. Through it all is well defined characters I enjoyed getting to know, and wanted to know more about them.

As mentioned, it took me a while to read this whole book, but I was surprised when I went back to look through the stories rarely did I need to read past the first couple of pages to realize what this story was about, how it made me feel, and whether I liked the characters.

There were a few stories I wanted to hear more. In the general "Ohhh what happened next?!!?!" feeling that a good short story is able to easily engender. A couple of them I wanted to hear more in the I don't mean to tell authors what to do, but Charlie Jane Anders I need to read more about the adventures of Sharon and Kango. More of their stories need to be heard!

Great collection. I enjoyed every story. Thanks Netgalley! Getting the book early did not affect my review.

I'm 40% done with Even Greater Mistakes: I take these stories a little bit at a time and have been thoroughly enjoying them. I keep thinking about Power Couple and its spot-on themes.

While I've stopped and started with Anders' long form fiction, she is a top-notch short story person who rarely disappoints in that form.

Trigger warnings are pretty clearly outlined for each story, but I do have one of my own to add...
Trigger Warning: Contains thought-provoking content even amidst elements of whimsy, weirdness, quirks, and kink. If you are seeking something light and fluffy (which is also perfectly acceptable), this collection is not for you.

When I read Charlie Jane Anders now, it's because sometimes things feel like a lot. The world feels like a lot. We're overwhelmed by a lot. Then Charlie Jane takes you by the hand and says, "Come, let me show you something." For a moment in time, we step out of the world as we know it and into the world as she has imagined it in her stories. It's sometimes hopeful, not always pleasant, usually really weird, pretty cool, and relevant. I can't say I always step back into the real world feeling comforted, but I do smile. I smile because I feel like someone else also knows that the world is a lot and they want to talk about it through power couples and wish facilitators (genies) and ghosts and cat games and zombie vampires and fairy werewolves and bookstores.

Very rarely will every short story/novella in a collection appeal to everyone, and this is no different. At 19 stories (in ARC), it felt a bit long, but each seemed special to Anders. If that's the case, keep them all Charlie Jane! I really enjoyed approximately half of the works, but that would still be enough for me to buy this collection and recommend it to others.

I have not read a collection by a single author where each piece was preceded by a brief commentary. This really works in Anders's favor, especially for those who have come to know and love her voice off the page, through social media, TED Talks, book talks and beyond. It was a nice added bonus.

#EvenGreaterMistakes #NetGalley

I'd never read any of Charlie Jane Anders' work before, although I have heard of her work, so I thought a collection of short stories would be a great place to start. Unfortunately, despite reading several of them, I failed to take a liking to her writing style and subject matter, and I'm afraid that if I read more I'll only serve to exacerbate this indifference into dislike. Because of this, I don't feel comfortable posting a review on this collection.

This is a terrific collection of Anders's stories. Some readers may be a bit lost in the pieces that follow up on the author's novels, but the standalone stories are entertaining and thought-provoking. Readers get a board range of genres and approaches; there's something for just about everyone.

A nice assortment of short stories, mostly sci-fi or sci-fi adjacent. Some better than others, but all were interesting and kept my attention. My favorite one was “A Temporary Embarrassment in Spacetime”.

Having enjoyed a few of Anders’ short stories as well as one of her novels, I was happy to read Even Greater Mistakes. While (inevitably with a short story collection) I enjoyed some stories more than others, overall I really enjoyed this collection – it feels cohesive without feeling repetitive, and includes a mix of serious, difficult stories and lighthearted comedic ones. The inclusion of brief introductions to each story is effective: I appreciated knowing a bit of the backstory of the composition of each story, including where the stories were first published and how (if at all) they overlap with Anders’ novels. I didn’t care for “Rock Manning Goes for Broke” though I’ve no doubt other readers will; my favourite stories were “A Temporary Embarrassment in Spacetime” (space opera fun that pokes fun at space operas in a great way), “The Bookstore at the End of America” (political + hopeful), and “Love Might Be Too Strong a Word” (thought-provoking take on sexual normativity).
Content warning: Anders provides brief introductions which include content warnings at the beginning of each story. Warnings include transphobia, racism, suicide, abuse, sexual assault, torture, religious extremism, mental health struggles, medical horror.
Thank you to Macmillan-Tor/Forge / Tor Books and NetGalley for providing an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Charlie Jane Anders is one of the most interesting voices of the latest generation of US SF authors. This volume is a collection of probably the best of their wide production of short fiction.
It contains stories I had already the occasion of reading and annoying, like the Time Travel Club, with others that were new for me and a real treat, like Rat's Catcher Yellows. Charlie Jane style is unmistakable, the story characters' development is always masterly crafted, and the plots are never trivial. The themes explore sides of the human behaviour that rarely make the object of mainstream SF,
Read this volume, it won't be a mistake.

Even Greater Mistakes by Charlie Jane Anders
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I was actually rather impressed with a number of these short stories. The sheer creativity is highlighted and when the shorts work, they have some pretty brilliant world-view skewing and worldbuilding that is definitely off-center and enjoyable.

I enjoyed most of these. There were, however, a few that were still good for the worldbuilding, but there were a LOT of stories that just seemed to glorify truly hot messes of relationships. Now, mind you, I don't care one way or another what KIND of relationships are described (use a large alphabet soup that goes on for a long time after the standard LGBTQ) but my enjoyment is kind of limited when the number of BAD relationships, slippery relationships, screwed-sideways relationships, and anchorless, random relationships take over the tale.

I'm all... huh, that sounds like some kind of hell and he/she/them is just fine with the insanity. I can't even tell what's going on. But good for them... this insanity isn't for me. I had the same issue with Ander's second novel. I loved the first one. And this happens many times in these stories.

So my takeaway is: It's one thing to represent. but it's another thing to dump pots of hot spaghetti on my head. HOWEVER, for any of you folks who want the wild, take anything you can get from any kind of person who'll give it up, THIS WILL probably be your speed and you'll love it.

Me, I just want good SF.


As Good As New - Easily my favorite of the bunch with a great dystopian Genie twist.

Rat-Catcher’s Yellows - Pretty interesting game setup.

If You Take My Meaning - Carry on with Ander's second novel.

The Time Travel Club - A good drill-down into space travel by way of a funny club.

Six Months, Three Days - Re-read, a classic Cassandra-type story about different kinds of future knowledge and how it messes with relationships.

Love Might Be Too Strong a Word - One of my favorites. Post-human, equivalent alien love story. :)

Vampire Zombie vs Fairy Werewolf - Good mostly for the schlock value. But it IS valuable to fandom. :)

Ghost Champagne - Very eerie and lovely and emotional.

My Breath Is a Rudder - Queer life in SF.

Power Couple - Didn't really do anything for me.

Rock Manning Goes For Broke - Pretty interesting stab at UF.

Because Change Was the Ocean and We Lived By Her Mercy - Great drowned SF story but the good worldbuilding parts were also drowned in way too much drama.

Captain Roger in Heaven - Not my favorite, but props to sexual violence and mental health issues.

Clover - Carry over to All the Birds in the Sky.

This Is Why We Can’t Have Nasty Things - Not SF so much as a regular LGBTQ extravaganza.

A Temporary Embarrassment in Spacetime - Fairly amusing space opera with a humorous vein.

Don’t Press Charges, and I Won’t Sue - Ander's response to 45's rise.

The Bookstore at the End of America - Also a political piece but it's still fun to have books involved. :)

The Visitmothers - A transitioning SF.

What can I say? It runs the gamut from funny to sad, to horrific. All of the stories affected me in some way, from smiles, tears, to out right revulsion for the story's universe. I can give no higher praise than to say that this book kept me awake until I finished it.

Anders talks in her introduction about how her original plan had been never to write novels, and as much as I enjoyed her first published deviation from that plan, All The Birds In The Sky, it's definitely her short work which most consistently wows me. This first mass-market collection takes in everything from the whimsical apocalypse of As Good As New to the harrowing Trump-era Don't Press Charges And I Won't Sue, by way of the wonderful philosophical finger-trap of Six Months, Three Days – in which a couple have different and entirely incompatible precognitive powers. Perfectly dramatising the difficulty of a relationship with someone who's working from fundamentally different assumptions to you, which is one of the things Anders does best, coming up with the most outlandish fantasy or SF conceits yet ones which also encapsulate entirely relatable situations. Though equally, especially in something like Fairy Werewolf vs. Vampire Zombie, it's perfectly possible to just enjoy many of the stories for the surface-level larks. The longest piece, novella Rock Manning Goes For Broke, follows a naif with a gift for stunts (which is to say, taking obscene amounts of damage and considering it all in a day's work) as America slides towards barbarism. It's slightly hampered by parts of its nightmare future already having been overtaken by events, and also by a reluctance (albeit an understandable one) on Anders' part to really go with the knockabout awfulness on which it's premised. But that's the beauty of a collection; if something like that didn't altogether click for me, it's soon followed by the wonderful This Is Why We Can't Have Nasty Things, which despite lacking any overtly non-realist elements, still captures the tragedy of another world being closed off forever, which is to say a favourite nightspot shutting down to become something boring instead. "San Francisco used to have a million pockets and folds in her long flowery skirts, where the strange and barely loved could create their own reality. Lately, not so much." London had a cracked leather jacket instead of a flowery skirt, but the experience of the nooks and crannies being flattened out is painfully familiar. Queer and clever, full of heart but often with an eyebrow raised, this is the best single-author short story collection I've read in a while.

(Netgalley ARC)

This is an excellent short story collection. My favorite stories were the first and the last, so good job editor.

Wonderful and thought provoking collection of SF short stories from the writer that has been called this generation's Le Guin. Many of the stories have appeared in Year's Best anthologies.. Charlie Jane Anders is a must buy, and has been so ever since her debut All The Birds in the Sky.

[I received a free ARC of this title from Netgalley in exchange for a review]

Charlie Jane Anders is best known for novels like THE CITY IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT and ALL THE BIRDS IN THE SKY.

In this collection, she showcases her first love: short fiction!

And what a showcase it is: time travel stories where movement in time equals movement in space; postapocalyptic stories where a bitter theater-critic-turned-genie seems to only have the power to cause yet another apocalypse; and many, many more. (Including, for fans of CITY, a sequel short story to that!)

I enjoyed all the stories I read in this volume, and they often left me with a smile on my face and a warmth in my heart even when the ending wasn't the happiest. As an author of short fiction myself, I especially appreciated Anders's little comments at the start of each story, describing what she wanted to accomplish with it or something interesting about its origin or advice on writing based on her own experiences.

If you love SFF short fiction, definitely give this collection a try.

This is a fine collection of some really well-written science fiction and fantasy stories. Charlie Jane Anders has a talent for creating vibrant characters that drive fascinating plots. My favorites from this collection are "Fairy Werewolf vs. Vampire Zombie", "Rock Manning Goes for Broke", “Rat Catcher’s Yellows”, and the best story by far is “The Bookstore at the End of America”. This collection was very fun read and I would highly recommend it to Anders fans and anyone who enjoys brilliant speculative fiction.

I confess to already being a big fan of Anders' writing before this book (and I've read a few of the stories before, like Bookstore at the End of America, which remains a favorite), but I promise my review is unbiased. That said, anyone who enjoys her longer fiction will find much to love in this collection. It highlights the variety of her writing and, while no one will like every single story, every reader will find something amazing in this collection.

I enjoyed this character-driven anthology. Of the nineteen stories, I found seven to be excellent. These include “As Good as New”, “Rat Catcher’s Yellows”, and my favorite, “The Bookstore at the End of America”. Eight of the stories were good and there were four I didn’t like, including “The Visitmothers” and “A Temporary Embarrassment in Spacetime”. Overall, this anthology is well worth reading. Thank you to Netgalley and Macmillan-Tor/Forge for the advance reader copy.

A thoroughly enjoyable book of sci-fi short stories. I liked the explanations of how the stories came were written.

Review of Uncorrected Digital Galley

A collection of nineteen science fiction/fantasy tales filled with unexpected twists on classic tropes, gender, heartbreak while offering [often with humor] social commentary in a variety of settings. Each imaginative story stands alone, filling its own particular niche in this compilation.

Consider a genie in a bottle, found by a survivor in an apocalyptic world. Or a game developed for dementia sufferers. Perhaps a tale of Human-Gelet hybrids or a contemplation of the possibilities of time travel. Perhaps a vampire/zombie tale or a bookstore standing at the border between the United States and the now separate country of California. The widely-varied content is sure to give readers much to consider.

A short commentary by the author prefaces each story.

Recommended.

I received a free copy of this eBook from Macmillan-Tor/Forge and NetGalley
#EvenGreaterMistakesy #NetGalley

Charlie Jane Anders is one of the great voices in contemporary speculative fiction. As expected, her first short story collection is a joy to read--funny, witty, charming, touching, adventurous, and, most of all, immensely and impressively imaginative.

The introduction alone is worth the price of admission. It offers a delightful little tour through some of the steps, missteps, and leaps Anders took along the way to becoming a beloved SFF titan. This introduction, along with the notes before each story, heightens the feeling that this collection is in some ways both showcase and masterclass, a glimpse at some of the possible ways to make it as a writer. This structure lends the book a warm and generous atmosphere that is, of course, only fitting for the kinds of stories Anders tells within.

As is often the case with short story collections--particularly collections spanning a writer's career--Even Greater Mistakes is not completely even in tone. None of the stories are bad, or even mediocre, but not every single one is absolutely fantastic. Most of them are fantastic, though, and of course such things are subjective. Particular highlights for me included the clever "As Good as New", the heartbreaking "Rat Catcher's Yellows", the silly but steadfast "Fairy Werewolf vs. Vampire Zombie", the hilariously devastating novella "Rock Manning Goes for Broke", and, most especially, the poignantly hopeful "The Bookstore at the End of America". With 19 stories to choose from, this collection offers more than enough range to satisfy any Anders fan and create more than a few new ones.

Overall, this is a thrilling, fascinating, and extremely fun collection I'd call a must-read not only for existing Anders fans but also for anyone who appreciates the possibilities of 21st-century speculative short fiction.

I received a free e-ARC of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.