The Mammoth Book Of Future Cops - anthology edited by Maxim Jakubowski & M. Christian

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The Mammoth Book Of Future Cops - anthology edited by Maxim Jakubowski & M. Christian
Pub: Constable & Robinson. 498 page enlarged paperback. Price: Ł 6.99 (UK). ISBN: 1-84119-502-2

check out website: www.constablerobinson.com

Now this isn’t a book that you’re going to miss on the shelves as the title is in day-glo orange is going to positively beam at you from cover or spine. It’s a shame I have to be so despondent about some of the 33 stories contained within.

A book purporting to be about future cops should be an indication of the state of affairs of detecting crime in the future and yet so few do it here, often just looking at the criminal act itself without solving the crime.

Comparing the promotional slip to the authors actually used tends to lead me to believe that this book’s editors couldn’t get the clearances on some of the stories they would have liked to use and had to get thirteen alternatives to meet the deadline.

Such actions can always tend to leave things a little muddling with a balance between cops and robbers even worse when it diminishes any possibility of detective work. SF tends to be a heavily researched subject to write in. To write something with a detective slant and I can’t see the future in policing as just having a bobby or cop on the street in it as well, even more so.

This isn’t to say the stories aren’t written well but there’s also a lot of misgivings about the endings. Short stories are supposed to be capable of giving thoughtful or twist endings but here it got to the state where far too many petered out as if the writers either ran out of ideas or didn’t know what to do next.

I don’t blame the publishers or editors in this. I’ve seen it far too often in other books as well. If anything, it’s a reflection of far too much form over substance that is invading our genre at the moment.

That’s not to say that there isn’t some noticeable exceptions to the above here. China Mieville’s ‘An End To Hunger’ is a lovely character play of conspiracy on information on the Internet. Liz Evans’ ‘Digital Honey’ would make a great TV anthology story even if it is using an old theme of non-identity. Some like Jay Caselberg’s ‘Fishing’, Jerry Sykes ‘Sleep That Burns’ and ‘Cecilla Tan’s ‘In Silver A’ should be realities that need further exploring.

Oddly enough, I didn’t have much problem in reading the book straight through. For deadline purposes, it is easy to become jaded or tired with such long anthologies.

I think I kept going expecting the warm-ups to have better pay-offs than they did. Whatever, there’s enough new material here to ensure there is something for everyone at a price everyone can afford.

GF Willmetts

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