Title: Summer FrostAuthor: Blake Crouch
Series: Forward Collection #2
First Published: September 17, 2019
Publisher: Amazon Original Stories
Pages: 75
Genre: LGBTQ, Science Fiction, Short Stories, Speculative Fiction
Format: Ebook
Source: Prime Reading
Rating:
Synopsis:
A video game developer becomes obsessed with a willful character in her new project, in a mind-bending exploration of what it means to be human by the New York Times bestselling author of Recursion.
Maxine was made to do one thing: die. Except the minor non-player character in the world Riley is building makes her own impossible decision—veering wildly off course and exploring the boundaries of the map. When the curious Riley extracts her code for closer examination, an emotional relationship develops between them. Soon Riley has all new plans for her spontaneous AI, including bringing Max into the real world. But what if Max has real-world plans of her own?
Buy the Book: AmazonReview
I slept on this novella and I am sorry for it because Summer Frost is the best story in the entire Forward Collection. I always really enjoy stories about artificial intelligence and robots, it is one of those topics in science fiction that veers into a dangerous uncanny valley once the question of humanity is brought into the equation. Many of the stories that explore this topic inevitably lead to similar conclusions, that AI can never fully be human, but Summer Frost digs a little deeper.
A game developer, Riley, becomes obsessed with a seemingly miraculous break in an NPC’s script, and the NPC begins to act of its own accord. I’ll admit that I initially wrote this plot point off as ridiculous, having dabbled in coding and game design as not plausible. I suspended my belief that the story takes place in the future so who knows? As the story developed I couldn’t help but love it despite my initial doubts.
Riley covets her creation and lets the obsession with her research take over her life. There is a lot to unpack here about work, relationships, the expression of gender, love, consciousness, morals, and humanity. Riley wants to develop Max, the miraculous AI, to serve the greater good of humanity, but how? The story is written with the full awareness of the dangerous pitfalls of stories past with AI rising up against humans, so wouldn’t it be better to make the AI human, to think, feel, sense the world around them, to have an image of self? As God created man in his own image.
I was so satisfied with the ending of this story, I don’t know why I didn’t expect it, but I am glad that my expectations were subverted. Summer Frost is a thoughtful addition to the library of literature focusing on artificial intelligence that brings some new ideas to the table and wraps it up nicely in a heartfelt story of one person’s imperfections, their selfishness, and their limitations.
Quote
“I’m afraid, Riley. I think, therefore I fear. And you made me this way. You built and shaped me to process reality like you do. To feel.”
Content Warnings
View Spoiler »About the Author
About Blake Crouch
Blake Crouch is a bestselling novelist and screenwriter. He is the author of the novel, Dark Matter, for which he is writing the screenplay for Sony Pictures. His international-bestselling Wayward Pines trilogy was adapted into a television series for FOX, executive produced by M. Night Shyamalan, that was Summer 2015’s #1 show. With Chad Hodge, Crouch also created Good Behavior, the TNT television show starring Michelle Dockery based on his Letty Dobesh novellas. He has written more than a dozen novels that have been translated into over thirty languages and his short fiction has appeared in numerous publications including Ellery Queen and Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine. Crouch lives in Colorado.
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