🌟 "Terminal Boredom" by Izumi Suzuki

Translated from Japanese into English by Polly Barton, Sam Bett, David Boyd, Daniel Joseph, Aiko Masubuchi, and Helen O'Horan. This is a collection of sci-fi short stories from the 1970s and wow, I loved reading them. I was surprised by how incredibly contemporary they felt, timeless even. With its realistically written characters, the stories worked well on this small, everyday scale, but the stories also never lost sight of the bigger scale societal critique. There's a tale being told in the foreground, but in the background there are always little clues about the state of the world. Every ending is strong. The author never lets the reader hanging, she kindly cuts the thread so you can plummet into a black hole. I think the way all those elements come together was done very well. It's hard to talk about all of the stories in general, so I'll give a few thoughts per story. Women and Women: Maybe this is my least favorite of the collection. It's about a matriarchal society that has…