Axiomatic

Fantastic, Ted Chiang's vibes here and there. Really glad to have found out about Egan (and a fellow Australian too!!!)

All the stories are good but

for me The Infinite Assassin is the winner

I'd rate this 2.5 stars if I could, but I can't. I read this after /loving/ Egan's book Permutation City, but found this collection of short stories wanting. It feels a lot like the feeder ideas that went into Permutation City, but explored less well here than there. Most of the stories washed over me without leaving a trace; but The Darkness and the time travel one were absolute masterpieces and have both stuck with me (except, evidently, the title.)

The overarching theme of the stories (like Permutation City) is “what does it mean to be me?” Axiomatic explores this question under the lens of twins, parallel universes, time travel, P-zombies, designer embryonics, brain transplants, body transplants, and the merging of two minds. A few of them are interesting, but it gets repetitive, and there are many more misses than hits here.

If you're looking for some dark ass, heavy, depressing short stories with a hard SF twist, this might be the book for you. There are a few gems to be found here, but I'd strongly suggest reading other books in between these stories.