For fans of science fiction, a lot of The Gollancz Book of South Asian Science Fiction might make for a squeamish read. Some sublime stories apart, the fare falls short of being quality literary SF, being unable to avoid falling into two traps: using a platform meant for philosophical thought-experimentation to air contemporary political peeves; and contenting itself with being an ethnological breakout as opposed to actually pioneering thought, thus squandering the core exploratory opportunities afforded to the SF writer.The stories are set in South Asian contexts. Names, locations, paraphernalia, issues are all subcontinental, which is as limiting as it is refreshingly local. But in some cases, the cadences and voices, especially in translated stories from a former period, sound awkward enough to impede reader immersion. Some read like screenplays, not full-hewn literary works, demanding too much indulgence and disbelief-suspension from the reader. Some are derivatively pulpy. And since the stories are short and many, the book ends up sacrificing depth for breadth.South Asia is certainly entitled to get its due in SF, in terms of authorship as well as backdrop. But the genre itself is hardly young. Having evolved from being a mere conceptual iteration of an alternative reality, it has matured into a literary form that can paint a picture rather than be a list of stage directions.That said, the concepts and themes inventoried in the collection are as timelessly radical - benevolent telepathic aliens play the perfect host to intergalactic human colonisers while maleficent ones poison humanity for the greater good; Vedic verses serve as clues to unravelling an inter-dimensional knot and preventing nuclear cataclysm; a family learns that re-simulating historic trauma might be more convoluted than cathartic; an Indian doctor bends time to rationalise Indian tardiness - as you’d find in any standard work of SF.Then there are stories that evoke great pathos and dystopian dread, as they go into schizophrenia, censorship, identity, and divinity, staples of SF. It’s the personal stories, exploring the human condition, that really work the best in this collection. The poems are transcendental enough to get you feeling that prose isn’t nearly as efficacious an instrument as verse when it comes to marrying futurism with philosophy in the most aesthetic way. For fans of science fiction, a lot of The Gollancz Book of South Asian Science Fiction might make for a squeamish read. Some sublime stories apart, the fare falls short of being quality literary SF, being unable to avoid falling into two traps: using a platform meant for philosophical thought-experimentation to air contemporary political peeves; and contenting itself with being an ethnological breakout as opposed to actually pioneering thought, thus squandering the core exploratory opportunities afforded to the SF writer.The stories are set in South Asian contexts. Names, locations, paraphernalia, issues are all subcontinental, which is as limiting as it is refreshingly local. But in some cases, the cadences and voices, especially in translated stories from a former period, sound awkward enough to impede reader immersion. Some read like screenplays, not full-hewn literary works, demanding too much indulgence and disbelief-suspension from the reader. Some are derivatively pulpy. And since the stories are short and many, the book ends up sacrificing depth for breadth.South Asia is certainly entitled to get its due in SF, in terms of authorship as well as backdrop. But the genre itself is hardly young. Having evolved from being a mere conceptual iteration of an alternative reality, it has matured into a literary form that can paint a picture rather than be a list of stage directions.That said, the concepts and themes inventoried in the collection are as timelessly radical - benevolent telepathic aliens play the perfect host to intergalactic human colonisers while maleficent ones poison hu