Exhalation

Praise

“Illuminating, thrilling. . . . Like such eclectic predecessors as Philip K. Dick, James Tiptree, Jr., Jorge Luis Borges, Ursula K. Le Guin, Margaret Atwood, Haruki Murakami, China Miéville, and Kazuo Ishiguro, Chiang has explored conventional tropes of science fiction in highly unconventional ways. . . . Individual sentences possess the windowpane transparency that George Orwell advocated as a prose ideal. . . . It is both a surprise and a relief to encounter fiction that explores counterfactual worlds like these with . . . ardor and earnestness. . . . Human curiosity, for Chiang, is a nearly divine engine of progress.”
—Joyce Carol Oates, The New Yorker
 
“Masterful and striking. . . . A fusion of pure intellect and molten emotion. . . . Represents the ideal definition and practice of all science fiction. . . . [Chiang’s] career thus deservedly joins those of only a handful of past masters who likewise did their best work in miniature: Edgar Allan Poe, Harlan Ellison, Ray Bradbury, Theodore Sturgeon. . . . His challenging and rewarding fiction proves that a sizable and appreciative audience exists for the kind of speculative fiction that doesn’t merely offer cosmic explosions, but instead plucks both heartstrings and gray matter in equal measure.”
—Paul Di Filippo, The Washington Post

“A handful of living science fiction writers have attained godlike status—N.K. Jemisin, Cixin Liu, and Ann Leckie, to name a few. But Ted Chiang is the only one who’s done it without writing a novel. In fact, he’s published far less than his neighbors on the genre’s current Mount Rushmore, usually just one short story every two years. But oh, his stories. They’re a religious experience. . . . In Exhalation, which could be subtitled ‘Black Mirror For Optimists,’ every story seems crafted with one objective in mind—pure awe. . . . A moving book about fate and free will that is destined to become a literary landmark of the 2010s.”
—Adam Morgan, The A.V. Club

“These are humane, skillfully assembled stories, populated by vivid and memorable characters. . . . [Chiang’s] best stories boast a beguiling mix of compassion and awe. . . . His versatility and intellectual restlessness have yielded an immensely pleasing book.”
—Kevin Canfield, San Francisco Chronicle

“Ted Chiang’s stories are lean, relentless, and incandescent.”
—Colson Whitehead, author of The Underground Railroad
 
“Exquisite. . . . The stories in Exhalation are a shining example of science fiction at its best. They take both science and humanism deeply seriously.”
—Constance Grady, Vox

“Ted Chiang writes with such a matter-of-fact grace and visionary power that one simply takes on faith that his worlds and his characters exist, whether they are human or robot or parrot; he is the rare author who makes me feel, also, that he believes in his readers, in our integrity and our imagination.”
—Karen Russell, author of Orange World
 
“Ted Chiang has no contemporary peers when it comes to the short story form. His name deserves to be mentioned in the same breath as Carver, Poe, Borges, and Kafka. Every story is a universe. Every story is a diamond. You will inhale Exhalation in a single, stunned sitting, because true genius doesn’t come along nearly as often as advertised. This is the real thing.”
—Blake Crouch, author of Dark Matter

“Chiang . . . tackles complex questions about free will, artificial intelligence, evolution and more in these nine stories that break down what it really means to be human.”
—Time, “Here Are the 10 New Books You Should Read in May”

“The greatness of the latest collection of stories by Ted Chiang isn’t in the answers to the big questions that he asks. It’s the questions themselves. . . . His prose is smooth and guileless, artful without pretension, always propelling the story forward. . . . Every little bit is believable, conceived carefully and thoughtfully.”
—Ryan Smith, The Columbus Dispatch

“Exquisitely crafted. . . . One after another, Chiang’s stories claim their place in your mind until you’re completely swept up in his provocative and at times even charming world. . . . Each story is a carefully considered, finely honed machine. . . . What makes Exhalation particularly brilliant is that not one of the stories feels like it’s designed to be thought-provoking in a stilted, academic way. Chiang is an entertaining, empathetic writer first, before being one of contemporary sci-fi’s intellectual powerhouses, and each story reads that way. . . . [Chiang is] one of the most exciting voices in his field.”
—BookPage (starred review)

“Chiang’s long-awaited second collection. . .continues to explore emotional and metaphysical landscapes with precise and incisive prose. . . . Chiang remains one of the most skilled stylists in sf, and this will appear to genre and literary-fiction fans alike.”
—Booklist (starred review)

“An instant classic. . . . Visionary speculative stories that will change the way readers see themselves and the world around them: This book delivers in a big way.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“Chiang produces deeply moving drama from fascinating first premises. . . . These stories are brilliant experiments, and his commitment to exploring deep human questions elevates them to among the very best science fiction.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
 
“Chiang is always thought provoking, and his latest collection is no exception.”
—Library Journal (starred review)