Mostly stuff from super prolific authors like Brandon Sanderson, with only a few from authors I came to know through their shorts first like Andrzej Sapkowski (the first books in The Witcher saga are compilations of short tales) and Isaac Asimov.
I am racking my brain trying to remember a title, and it's not working!
I had a sci fi short story collection, I think put out by some sci fi magazine or other, that focused on stories of survival - quite relevant to SSSS, come to think of it. They were all excellent. But I cannot for the life of me remember anything that would help me find the darn thing, or any of the titles. Except one: When Sysadmins Ruled the Earth, by Cory Doctorow. But that hasn't helped me find the anthology. There were a couple of other stories out of it that come to mind more often, but I can't remember titles or authors. In one, some kind of wormhole appears in a fogbank somewhere near Seattle, and the story follows the fate of several people affected by it; another involves the brain-wasting disease kuru. If those ring bells with anyone, I would love to figure out who wrote them!
I see several interesting suggestions in this thread! :) How will I find time to check them all?
Vulpes, is it Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse? (I've never read it, I just went to Goodreads to see if the When Sysadmins Ruled the Earth page mentioned any collections, and that anthology was brought up in one of the reviews.)
@Vulpes Is it Dawn, and Sunset, and the Colours of the Earth by Michael F. Flynn, published in Year's Best SF 12?
A Seattle ferry disappears into a strange disturbance, taking all of its passengers with it. The families of those who went missing try to cope, the city and others investigate, and scientists attempt to develop theories as to what happened.
I found this one by looking up "When Sysadmins Ruled the Earth" on isfdb (http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?494091) then using the highly scientific method of googling each likely anthology + seattle. Struck gold in an off-and blog mention. :'D
Other possibilities would be stories that cropped up in different issues of the same anthologies in which the sysadmins story appeared.
Sc0ut Do you remember any other details? Like date range, likely sites where you might have read it, keywords in the story?
Here’s a brilliant and very short story They Are Made Out of Meat by Terry Bisson (1991).
https://www.mit.edu/people/dpolicar/writing/prose/text/thinkingMeat.html
I want to dedicate this post to @thegreyarea
Here’s a brilliant and very short story They Are Made Out of Meat by Terry Bisson (1991).Wow, the meaty membranes that cover those gelatin-filled spheres that capture light and turn it in electric-chemical impulses openned wide when I saw that mention, and my sponge-like meaty brain jumped in excitement!
https://www.mit.edu/people/dpolicar/writing/prose/text/thinkingMeat.html
I want to dedicate this post to @thegreyarea
tap several times at small plastic squeres on a machine*So glad to hear that ...
*Uff, something that's not made of meat!
So glad to hear that ...
https://www.deviantart.com/madzematix/art/Meat-Keyboard-574667239
So glad to hear that ...That's one very meaty meat-keyboard! I'd like mine well done, please.
https://www.deviantart.com/madzematix/art/Meat-Keyboard-574667239
It looks like the pork base is wrapped in plastic. That would be a definite smelly mess if it was lit aflame.."Please remove the wrapping before cooking" :D
Here’s another nice one in the Earth is a Death World genre. I’m not sure if this is actually a collaborative short story, a joke, poetry even? But it’s entertaining!"Yes, yes, 'Esteemed Invasion Commander', I heard you - no need to beat me again with that wet fluke of yours. So you plan to erect an off-planet base where your troops can catch their breath without any threat from Earth's fauna and flora, and without your ships being rendered immobile because they have to serve as space stations. And you want to put it on the Moon (https://www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-49265125)."