Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach

Written by Kelly Robson

Narrated by Nancy Wu

Discover a shifting history of adventure as humanity clashes over whether to repair their ruined planet or luxuriate in a less tainted past. In 2267, Earth has just begun to recover from worldwide ecological disasters. Minh is part of the generation that first moved back up to the surface of the Earth from the underground hells, to reclaim humanity's ancestral habitat. She's spent her entire life restoring river ecosystems, but lately the kind of long-term restoration projects Minh works on have been stalled due to the invention of time travel. When she gets the opportunity take a team to 2000 BC to survey the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, she jumps at the chance to uncover the secrets of the shadowy think tank that controls time travel technology.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Recorded Books, Inc.
• Release date: Sep 21, 2018
• ISBN: 9781980011880

Kelly Robson

Kelly Robson lives in downtown Toronto with her wife, writer A.M. Dellamonia. Her novelette “A Human Stain” won the 2018 Nebula Award, and her time travel adventure Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach won the 2019 Aurora Award and was a finalist for the Hugo, Nebula, Theodore Sturgeon, and Locus Awards. Kelly’s first short story collection Alias Space and Other Stories was published in 2021. Find her on Twitter and Instagram.

Reviews for Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach

[Alison Kopit · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Though there were some interesting sci fi elements, I found the plot quite trite. Despite being very short, this story was hard to get through.

[davisfamily-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Not bad, but didn't really engage me. The vignettes at the beginning of each chapter gave away most of the story, so the ending was very meh...

[Mike Ray · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Outstanding story. Intelligent extrapolation and excellent characterization. Have looked up the author’s other work and enjoyed it as well!

[sturlington_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A lot going on in this short book. It felt like a prologue to a longer story, and given the way it ended, I think it probably is. It took me a bit to get into it because there is so much going on here--the long-term effects of climate change resulting in different survival-based habitats, a critique on economics and banking, interactions between the generations reminiscent of today's generational clashes, lots of biopunk, and of course, time travel. Once the characters did travel back in time to early Mesopotamia and the story was a bit more compacted, I got a lot more invested. I would like to see how these characters handle their situation given that they were stranded in ancient history--although if the rules of time travel established in this world hold, I guess it's all kind of moot. I don't think it's that cut and dried, though; that would be disappointing.

[renbedell · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A science fiction novella where Earth is under dire straits and majority of humans have to live underground. As humans start to recolonize the surface they need to use time travel to learn from the past. The main protagonist, who is half human/half cybernetic octopus, goes on a journey to Mesopotamia with her crew and of course things don't go as planned. It is a very good novella where I would like to see more in this type of setting. It is written very well and has many exciting elements. It can be slow at times and I wish it would have explored the theme more.

[iansales_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I don’t think I’ve read anything by Robson previously, but her name sounded vaguely familiar– Ah, she won a Nebula for Best Novelette last year, and is another of the Clarkesworld/Tor.com stable, members of which have appeared on many shortlists in the last couple of years. Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach was published by Tor.com. In fact, five of the six novellas on this year’s shortlist were published by Tor.com. Which is a problem. Anyway, Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach is set on a post-climate crash Earth, in which a much-reduced population live in small high-tech communities. There are people who work on fixing the damage caused by the climate crash, in an effort to create a world that can be repopulated to former levels. The protagonist of this story is one of them. She also has eight prosthetic legs, like an octopus. And she is part of a team, if not its leader, which submits a proposal for an environmental impact study which involves time travel back to Sumeria. It sounds messy as fuck, but Robson manages to make it all hang together. There are problems: it’s not entirely clear what the team from the future are trying to achieve, the personal politics are confused with the wider political situation, and the POV is peculiarly narrow given the world-building. It actually reads like part of a series where much of the world-building was handled in earlier works, but I’m not sure that’s the case. It’s a reasonably well-handled piece, and the prose itself neither stands out nor is an obstacle – and the latter is certainly something that could be said of other nominees. I’m not sure if it deserves to be on the shortlist… but on balance, I’d say its presence is not embarrassing.

[fred_mouse · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Amazingly rich and detailed story, which includes two lots of sophisticated world building, the ethics of time travel, and beautifully presented science. Characterisation is superb, the writing invisible, and the interweaving of the two timelines skillful.

[wyvernfriend · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Into a ruined world some scientists try to work out a way to fix the problems before they happen and find themselves in the past where things get more and more complicated as time goes by. It hasn't been long since I finished it and I honestly don't remember much of it, it wasn't terrible but it failed to make much of an impression on me. sadly.

[g33kgrrl · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a post-eco-collapse time travel novella. It's got interesting characters and a good story but left me feeling just a little... unsatisfied, perhaps. I enjoyed it, however.

[liscarey · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

In a future, post-ecological disaster and economic collapse Earth, Minh is part of the first generation to move back to the surface from the underground refuges humanity built to survive, and has spent her career doing river ecosystems. Unfortunately, funding for that work has now dried up, following the invention of time travel. The main uses of time travel are tourism and historical research, but now, at last, there's a proposal to use it for past-state research on the Tigris and Euphrates river system. Minh jumps at the chance, putting together a small but very capable team.It wouldn't be right, exactly, to say everything goes horribly wrong.The people in control of time travel may or may not be better than Minh thinks they are. They may or may not be right, or honest, about the past time they enter being an alternate bubble that collapses back into the main timeline when the time travelers depart, leaving history unaffected.And Fabian, the "tactical historian" from the time travel company, may or may not be getting his 100% safety record from what others might consider an unethical use of time travel.It's both interesting and well-written, no question. It's just very much not for me, at all.I received this story in the 2019 Hugo Voters Packet.

[cindywho-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A few hundred years from now, a cranky elder ecologist with 6 legs is working on a project to restore the ruins of rivers - an opportunity to travel into the past brings in an eager intern and a colleague who really just wants to see some great horses. What could go wrong?

[souloftherose · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A Tor.com novella that has made both the Nebula and Hugo shortlists this year - there's a lot of world-building for a short work but I enjoyed what I could get my head round. There's a post-apocalyptic world where a group are hired to time travel back to 2024 BCE to analyse the ancient Tigris and Euphrates rivers. I liked the relationships and team dynamics especially the fact that there were older protagonists mixed with younger and the look at the relationship dynamics between the two. I'd definitely be interested in reading more set in this world.

[quondame · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Two octogenarians and a twenty-something pursue and win a contract to time travel from a post-apocolyptic 23rd century to 2024 BC to do an environmental study the ancient Tigris & Euphrates region as a baseline to its reconstruction. The world building and characters were engrossing, the writing didn't annoy me, and the incidents and action were well handled. I found the bad guy just too bad and not that interesting, but his role and character did fit. But the set up didn't make sense to me - why pick that time period, when there was no reason given for not going earlier? It isn't as if the region could be restored to any specific time period or the rivers to any previous flow channels. But the inter-generational reveals are the heart of the book and they were what I hope Kelly Robson deals with in future stories.