Widdam, by Vandana Singh

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(Dystopia) Five vignettes showing how three people get by in a horribly polluted world ravaged by climate change where giant, intelligent mining machines chew up the landscape in search of metals and oil. (13,229 words; Time: 44m)

Rating: ★★☆☆☆ Not Recommended

Shikasta, by Vandana Singh

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(SF Exploration) Four college friends collaborated on a probe to an extrasolar planet. Now they’re struggling to make sense of what the probe is telling them and wondering if they need new definitions for life and even for science itself. (14,251 words; Time: 47m)

Rating: ★★☆☆☆ Not Recommended

Of Wind and Fire, by Vandana Singh

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(Scientific Fantasy) The villages fall slowly down the face of the mountain, trading with the people on the ledges as they go, but is there a bottom, or does it just go down forever? (10,944 words; Time: 36m)

Rating: ★☆☆☆☆ Needs Improvement

Recommended By: GDozois:4

Ambiguity Machines: An Examination, by Vandana Singh

Tor.com, April 29, 2015; 7,872 words
Rating: 3, Good, ordinary, story

Three different accounts of (modern day) human encounters with "ambiguity machines" are presented, each one a story in itself.

Mini-Review (click to view--possible spoilers)

Pro: Each of the three stories is beautifully written, and each of the different "machines" is imaginative and interesting. The first machine makes the rest of the world immaterial. The second is a time machine, and the third is a mind-meld machine. All three change the user forever.

Con: There's not a single line of dialogue in the whole thing. The framing story about an exam is very flimsy.