Sylvie Lainé

Sylvie Lainé is a well-known name in the world of French science-fiction stories. She has written mainly short-stories and lots of them. They were published in anthologies and magazines, and republished throughout the years. Some were even translated in Greek and Czech, for example. With other stories, she won some prizes.

Since she's written so much from the 1980s till the present day, it was time to bring together the best stories, or at least, what she considered the best stories or those that deserved to be assembled for this compilation/anthology ([b:Fidèle à ton pas balancé|33000425|Fidèle à ton pas balancé|Sylvie Lainé|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1479381336s/33000425.jpg|53643076]), which was published earlier in 2016. Two years later, the collection is re-issued in pocket format through the Collection Hélios label of Les Éditions ActuSF.

The book contains 26 stories (sandwiched between a foreword and a bibliography of where each story was taken from and when they were published; between 1985 and 2015), taken from various previous publications, like [b:Marouflages|22571241|Marouflages|Sylvie Lainé|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/book/50x75-a91bf249278a81aabab721ef782c4a74.png|42037690] (all stories; publisher's page), [b:L'Opéra de Shaya|21971360|L'Opéra de Shaya|Sylvie Lainé|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1398166704s/21971360.jpg|41281278] (all stories; publisher's page), [b:Espaces Insécables|6558010|Espaces Insécables|Sylvie Lainé|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1348483483s/6558010.jpg|6750654] (publisher's page), [b:Le Miroir aux éperluettes|26201552|Le Miroir aux éperluettes|Sylvie Lainé|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1441051310s/26201552.jpg|46178773] (all stories; publisher's page), magazines like Galaxies, and more.

These stories were put together by theme, as follows:

Partie 1: Ébauches et Tentatives
Question de mode - 3/5
Le Prix du billet - 4/5
Mélomania - 4/5
Sirius m’était compté - 3/5
Le Printemps des papillons - 3/5

Partie 2: Essayons à Nouveau
Un rêve d’herbe - 4/5
Subversion 2.0 - 4/5
Thérapie douce - 2/5
Le Karma du chat - 2/5
Un signe de Setty - 4/5

Partie 3: Un Pied Dehors
Le Passe-plaisir - 3/5
Partenaires - 4/5
Petits arrangements intragalactiques - 4/5
Petits arrangements intragalactiques (Verso) (NEW) - 4/5

Partie 4: Hissons la Voile
Carte blanche - 4/5
Le Chemin de la Rencontre - 4/5
L’Opéra de Shaya - 4/5

Partie 5: Décalages
Définissez : priorités - 3/5
Grenade au bord du ciel - 4/5
Un amour de Sable - 3/5

Partie 6: Retour en Biais
Temps, bulles et patchouli - 4/5
La MIROTTE - 4/5
Toi que j’ai bue en quatre fois - 4/5 (I'm not a fan of Romance [well, Erotica is the genre under which this story "should" be catalogued, to be more precise], but Ms. Lainé did write a "decent" - [no] pun intended - story)

Partie 7: Reprendre Depuis le Début... et Tout Recommencer
Les Yeux d’Elsa - 4/5
La Bulle d’Euze - 2/5
Fidèle à ton pas balancé - 3/5

I'm not going to go into detail for each story. As is typical with anthologies, some stories do speak to you, move you, are to your liking, while others aren't or not as much. Therefore, I just added the points of the Belgian jury. As always, marks/grades/ratings remain a subjective element of a review.

Fact of the matter is, Sylvie Lainé is indeed a very good storyteller, who can handle various themes and subjects, while remaining in the field of science-fiction (the genre she prefers the most, because one can go into any direction, letting one's imagination free). She writes more from a character-driven approach (human relations, man's relation with nature, with other cultures, the implementation of technology in one's life, the choices you [don't] make in life and their impact, ...), with the necessary descriptions of the respective settings to bring the story in question more to life. Her SF is mostly not the "hard" kind, rather comparable to - as far as I can compare with my previously read books - that of [a:Ursula K. Le Guin|874602|Ursula K. Le Guin|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1244291425p2/874602.jpg], [a:Becky Chambers|8389735|Becky Chambers|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1494228249p2/8389735.jpg], [a:Robert Silverberg|4338|Robert Silverberg|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1366300348p2/4338.jpg], and similar.

If ever you wish to dive into Ms. Lainé's stories, then there is no better book than this anthology here. A varied Best Of that results in a unique document on this author's career.

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I was sent this book by Éditions ActuSF for review. Many thanks to them for the trust.… (más)