Ian Mond Reviews The Universe Delivers The Enemy You Need by Adam Marek

The Universe Delivers the Enemy You Need, Adam Marek (Comma Press 978-1-91269-775-5, £9.99, 244pp, tp) March 2024.

A large chunk of the 21 stories in Adam Marek’s new collection, The Universe Delivers the En­emy You Need – a magnificent title that’s sadly not shared by a single piece in the book – plays on similar concerns raised by Joel Dane in The Ragpicker: that technology is putting a significant dent in how we interact and connect. On the surface, it’s a reactionary argument that part of me wants to push against because I love my tech. And yet, I only need to chart the step change in Artificial Intelligence (google “Sora” to see where we are in terms of text-to-video generation and then imagine where that software will be two years from now, and tell me you don’t shiver just a little) to recognise that these fears are founded, that unfettered progress could lead to a breakdown of society, that maybe the Luddites were right all along. The tech-focussed tales in The Universe Delivers the Enemy You Need only add to that feeling of dread.

Note the “tech-focussed” qualifier. What’s lovely about Marek’s third collection is that it isn’t devoted to a single subject; there’s a wide variety of storytelling in terms of style, tone, and content. Take the opening piece, “We Won’t Show Any of This”, which has nothing to do with the coming technological storm. Instead, it’s this short, intense, absurdist monologue delivered by a director to their actor, rigorously detailing their character’s motivations, Roger. The gag, which is apparent early on, is that all this background about Roger’s parents (Kelly and Charles) and Roger’s iconoclastic search for meaning or why Roger is sitting in a cockpit (the cockpit of what?) is for a scene that, if it even stays in the film, will last for several seconds. Other stories like “The Ghosts We Make” – a couple realise that their lovemaking is creating tiny ghosts – or “Screws” – a parent keeps finding tiny screws in their kids’ bedroom, but where are they coming from? – play in a similarly surreal sandpit. The best of these is “The Bullet Racers”. It’s a journalistic account of the “Thaxton-Shyne Bullet Race”, which is “run in honour of Henry Spoke, who, on the beaches of Normandy, ran so fast from an enemy bullet that he felt it touch his back and drop harmlessly to the sand,” and the boy, Tyler Brook, who in previous year’s competition, beat the bullet. It’s a lovely, strangely poignant piece of writing.

There are other stories I enjoyed that have preposterous conceits but play up the comedic or darker elements of the tale. The very funny, but maybe a tad too long “Commit. Plunge. Bam!” sees Leopard Man provide relationship advice to Mr. Indomitable, whose powers are weakening (he burns his hand on the BBQ) due to doubts about his wife’s fidelity. With the story told entirely in dialogue, Marek milks the jokes for all their worth ending up with a product that’s both crude and sweet. The collection’s final story, “Defending thePencil Factory”, also has a ludicrous premise at its heart – a dojo of karate students holed up in a pencil factory, are fighting off a horde of monsters with sharpened pencils – but in actuality is a gory and effective horror tale that prickles the skin.

We return to the collection’s focus: the stories centred on technology. Marek doesn’t limit himself to one branch of tech. He gives us space stations, biologically grown buildings, dream re­search, augmented reality, and, of course, artificial intelligence. Stories like “Am I to Blame for the Fall of Driverless Humans”, “Poppins”, and “Pale Blue Dots” deal with the uneasy integration of technology – whether it be digital assistants or implants – into our daily lives. “Pale Blue Dots” is the creepiest of these, a first-person account from an AI assistant named Adrienne, who illegally makes a “faithful” copy of its client, a virtual ver­sion of “you” that will be free of doubts, worries, loneliness… and freedom. In the heartbreaking “It’s a Dinosauromorph, Dumdum”, a family uses augmented reality to hide the facial disfigurement of their son. The excellent “Lightspeed” explores the strain time dilation places on the relationship between a pilot and his family, while “Growing Skyscrapers” – which reads as the first chapter of what could be a marvellous novel – considers how growing a building from a seed, a technology that could reduce housing shortages across the globe, ultimately becomes another way to widen the divide between rich and poor.

All these stories, these thought experiments, query whether technology makes the world a better place. Does it bring us closer as a species? Does it enhance our relationship with those we love? In responding to these questions, the piece that spoke loudest to me was “End Titles”. It is presented as an episode of Desert Island Discs featuring radiologist Professor Brody Maitland, whose unearthing of the Hermes particle changes our understanding of life. But as he talks about his early career and what led up to the discovery of the particle, all the while choosing some banger end credits titles (like “Black Hole”, “Jaws”, and “Jurassic Park”), his deep-seated jealousy toward his sister – a famous violinist – emerges. The end­ing cuts deep: Maitland, so witty and erudite and sympathetic, might have changed the world, but all he’s left with is his bitterness.

I won’t lie; I would have loved a story featuring the collection’s title. Still, the high quality of the fiction – wise, quirky, sharp – makes up for the disappointment.

This review and more like it in the July 2024 issue of Locus.

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