Saying yes/and to Truth & Dare

Part 2 of the So Mayer interview, make-believe science and a non-binary God

(This piece originally appeared on my Substack, Artless. Subscribe to that here.)

Last week at the site Film Cred I published a feature on James Cameron’s career and what The Way of Water means for it, and it got me thinking: So Mayer’s short story collection Truth & Dare is the inverse of the Avatar series. Both worry at environmental destruction and the legacy of colonialism, both take inspiration from Ursula K Le Guin’s The Word for World is Forest, and both feature triumphant sea creatures. But while one is broad strokes and big picture, the other cherishes detail; while one harnesses the hoariest genre tropes, the other is simultaneously science fiction and sui generis. One cost a small moon to make, the other can be bought for £10.99.

I’m loath, however, to sell you on its stories by listing their individual fantastical conceits, like a waiter trying to tantalise you by naming everything on a smorgasbord. Too many collections get promoted in this way, especially science fiction/fantasy/horror-adjacent ones from literary fiction publishers, as though to brag about their author’s plenitude and imagination, and yet when you read the book you find all the quirky conceits are just a pile of uncashed cheques.