If We Cannot Go at the Speed of Light by Kim Cho-yeop

There has always been a strong tradition of Korean speculative fiction, a genre that has grown in popularity since the 1980s. But only recently have those works been released as English translations. The breadth of this output can be seen in recent releases which include Bora Chung’s short story collections (Cursed Bunny, Your Utopia  and The Midnight Timetable), Kim Sung-Il’s epic fantasy Bleeding Empire trilogy (the final volume of which is due in 2026), and Cheon Seon-Ran’s A Thousand Blues which centres around a robot jockey. If We Cannot Go At the Speed of Light is a collection of science fiction stories by Kim Cho-yeop. The collection is translated (as are the works of Bora Chung and Kim Sung-Il) by Anton Hur who has his own speculative fiction writing career.

If We Cannot Go At the Speed of Light is a collection of seven stories that run a gamut of science fiction ideas. But each put a unique spin on those ideas. Probably the most thought provoking is the opening story Symbiosis Theory. It would be difficult to say too much about this story without spoiling it except to say that it is a unique alien invasion tale that takes a while to reveal itself. Archival Loss takes a quite standard scifi idea of storing consciousness and creates something resonant and emotional out of it. The title story, If We Cannot Go At the Speed of Light is a poignant story about balancing work and family, this one jumping off from the idea that as galactic travel methods evolve some settled planets might be left behind.

While the subject matter varies wildly (including asking the question: what if emotions can be made solid? in The Materiality of Emotions), if there is any common theme in them it is one of family, the things we owe to family and the things that we never quite understand about those we are close to. The final story of the collection, My Space Hero, the only one specifically written for this collection, brings many of these themes to the fore.

If We Cannot Go At the Speed of Light is a diverse, always surprising collection of stories. And two of the stories in this collection – Archival Loss and the title story won the grand and runner-up prizes respectively at the 2017 Korean Science Fiction Awards. It once again shows the strength of the Korean scifi scene and provides a welcome taste of more to come.

If We Cannot Go at the Speed of Light by Kim Cho-yeop

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8.0/10