Mechanize My Hands to War
"Wagner wows in this nuanced look at the implications of AI on humanity...sharply imagined and all too plausible." —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
The emergence of artificial life intersects with state violence and political extremism in Erin K. Wagner’s rural Appalachia, where startlingly intimate portraits of survival and empathy bloom against a stark backdrop of loss.
September, 2060: Adrian Hall, acting director of the ATF, is holding a press conference. Yes, Eli Whitaker, anti-android demagogue, remains at large, and yes, he is recruiting children into his militia — Adrian is careful not to use the word army. She is careful all the way through the conference, right up until someone asks her about her personal connection to Whitaker; about Trey Caudill, his foster son.
July,…
Erin K. Wagner is an associate professor of liberal arts and sciences at SUNY Delhi and an active member of the SFWA. Her short fiction has appeared in Clarkesworld, Apex, and a number of other speculative fiction publications. She has two novellas, The Green and Growing (Aqueduct Press, 2019) and An Unnatural Life (Tordotcom, 2020).
