“The Great Silence” by Ted Chiang (collected in “Exhalation: Stories”)

The title telegraphs this is another Chiang story about aliens, an odd choice considering an acclaimed feature film was made based on Chiang’s last big story about aliens, and like almost every other time in this collection I went into a story thinking I had it nailed down, Chiang goes in a completely different and much more interesting direction. It captures less meaning in its 1,000+ words than “What’s Expected of Us”’s 800+ words, but there’s something interesting here in tackling a Great Silence besides The Great Silence. Perhaps giving this story somewhere to go would have found some gold.

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