Simone Heller

Survivors wandering across a ruined world encounter a museum.

I like the this hopeful story and the glimpse it gives of a weird post-apocalyptic future.

This has been nominated for the Hugo for Best Novelette and I can see why! It’s a hopeful story about survival, questioning what society teaches and finding a way to a better future. There’s also an AI with feelings.

Once, I might have felt out of place, an unwelcome disturbance. But I had left my fear of ghosts behind like an old skin a long time ago, and what I had found instead was the unforeseen, and sometimes pure beauty.

Listened to the story first. Reading it then brought some details to me.

The protagonist is an adopted child, outsider of the tribe. I suppose part of reasons why he's terribly alone and wanted friendship badly. The earth setting is deliberate. However it matters little. And I don't convinced their race is direct descendant of human kind. Who were they or how they developed intelligence is not clear.

To me, the whole story is touchingly uplifting.