"Stable Strategies for Middle Management" | |
---|---|
by Eileen Gunn | |
Language | English |
Genre(s) | Science fiction |
Published in | Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine |
Publication type | Magazine |
Publication date | June 1988 |
"Stable Strategies for Middle Management" is a science fiction short story published in 1988 by Eileen Gunn.
Margaret is a corporate executive who, to prove her loyalty to the company, undergoes bioengineering that gradually transform her into a giant insect.
"Stable Strategies for Middle Management" was a finalist for the 1989 Hugo Award for Best Short Story. [1]
Strange Horizons considered that it "must come high in any list of best SF short stories"; [2] similarly, Michael Swanwick has placed it on his personal "short list (...) of the best short stories of the late twentieth century." [3]
The story is inspired by Gunn's experiences as an advertising director at Microsoft. [4]
Gardner Raymond Dozois was an American science fiction author and editor. He was the founding editor of The Year's Best Science Fiction anthologies (1984–2018) and was editor of Asimov's Science Fiction magazine (1986–2004), garnering multiple Hugo and Locus Awards for those works almost every year. He also won the Nebula Award for Best Short Story twice. He was inducted to the Science Fiction Hall of Fame on June 25, 2011.
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Eileen Gunn is a science fiction author and editor based in Seattle, Washington, who began publishing in 1978. Her story "Coming to Terms", inspired, in part, by a friendship with Avram Davidson, won the Nebula Award for Best Short Story in 2004. Two other stories were nominated for the Hugo Award: "Stable Strategies for Middle Management" and "Computer Friendly" (1990).
Ellen Klages is an American science, science fiction and historical fiction writer who lives in San Francisco. Her novelette "Basement Magic" won the 2005 Nebula Award for Best Novelette. She had previously been nominated for Hugo, Nebula, and Campbell awards. Her first (non-genre) novel, The Green Glass Sea, was published by Viking Children's Books in 2006. It won the 2007 Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction. Portable Childhoods, a collection of her short fiction published by Tachyon Publications, was named a 2008 World Fantasy Award Finalist. White Sands, Red Menace, the sequel to The Green Glass Sea, was published in Fall 2008. In 2010 her short story "Singing on a Star" was nominated for a World Fantasy Award. In 2018 her novella Passing Strange was nominated for the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Adult Literature.
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Charlie Jane Anders is an American writer and commentator. She has written several novels as well as shorter fiction, published magazines and websites, and hosted podcasts. In 2005, she received the Lambda Literary Award for work in the transgender category, and in 2009, the Emperor Norton Award. Her 2011 novelette Six Months, Three Days won the 2012 Hugo and was a finalist for the Nebula and Theodore Sturgeon Awards. Her 2016 novel All the Birds in the Sky was listed No. 5 on Time magazine's "Top 10 Novels" of 2016, won the 2017 Nebula Award for Best Novel, the 2017 Crawford Award, and the 2017 Locus Award for Best Fantasy Novel; it was also a finalist for the 2017 Hugo Award for Best Novel.
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