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Wednesday, June 22, 2016

"Möbius" by Christopher Weber

Appeared in Writers of the Future 32.


Summary:
Detective Elizabeth Arus, who investigates gene crime, is on trail of a gene hacker. When she corners him, she is stabbed and loses consciousness.

After she awakes, her father hovers over her. He says that she had been knocked out and drugged for four days since her health required this. But what her colleagues tell her about the scene of her last memory--half of her blood discovered at the crime but not her body--and what her doctor father says about no cuts found on her body, do not add up. The answers she digs up unearths a larger secret.

Discussion with minor spoilers:
Weber's style is facile, akin to popular writers. While not especially evocative, it does enthrall. His tale here has a cool premise and mystery although the ending serves up "The Lady or the Tiger" keeping it from tackling the larger issues at stake. Since the title doesn't play an integral role in content, it suggests a more thematic use (perhaps like John Barth's "Frame-Tale" from Lost in the Funhouse or Samuel Delany's Dhalgren) although this use is not immediately evident unless we are meant to believe this has happened many times before, which the text has not indicated.

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