[Disclaimer: I got this book via LibraryThing's Early Reviewer program] This collection of stories, short and less short, varies from standard SF to... well, there are two stories ("Hands" and "Drip") I could not make any sense of. But in general I often remained with a hunch that I miss something. A brief comment on the other stories:

◆ The Loss of Luna - there's something I could not understand. 2/5
◆ Hungry - having three cats, I resonate with this. 4/5
◆ Mouth - Too much creepy for me. 1/5
◆ Only a Bird - really delicate Indeed it is not important whether the bird is made of flesh or cogs. 5/5
◆ Q-Be - interesting story about freemium models :), but it seems to end with too many loose ends. 3/5
◆ Ol’ St. Nick - plain space plot, but characters are not well defined. 3/5
◆ Level Up - post-apocalyptic story, plausible enough. 3/5
◆ Scout’s Honor - apart for the use of Español básico, nice story. 4/5
◆ D.E.A.T.H. - the best story of the lot, at least from the point of view of someone like me who programs. 5/5

By the way, I appreciated that at the end of each story Oak adds some lines to tell us how the idea came to her. ( )

Subtitle: A Short Story Collection: Book II

Disclaimer: I don't do reviews, I do commentary. I can't tell you about literary quality or whether it was objectively "good", and I don't believe anyone else can either. What I can tell you is what I think of a book or what it makes me think of or feel.

• The Loss of Luna
Meh, anthropomorphized planetary bodies aren't my thing.
• Hungry
About an almost talking cat. I was expecting a plot twist or something to make it interesting, but it was just a story about a person and cat and we didn't know either one well enough to care about them.
• Mouth
I don't remember this one. Oh... yeah, not my thing.
• Only a Bird
I enjoyed that one, largely because of the morality involved in the title. Humans are so narcissistic, which is totally natural, but if we want to be human instead of just apes in human costumes, then we need to get over it.
• Q-Be
Should have been more my thing but I never really got involved. I remember being confused by the ending, I don't know what was up with the professor and I didn't care enough to expend any effort.
• Hands
Don't remember this one... Ah, it was similar to Mouth, including my reaction to it.
• Ol' St. Nick
I liked this one although I wasn't really paying attention to the various relationships. Like so many other stories all the drama could have been avoided with an honest conversation. I wish authors would explore that more, and provide people examples of mature humans defusing drama through communication.
• Drip
Don't remember this one. Okay, it's another anxiety story like Mouth and Hands.
• Level Up
Don't remember this one. Oh, the homeless one. I was bit intrigued near the beginning but it went dark and I lost interest. I don't expect humanity to get their shit together but that doesn't mean I want to wallow in imaginary misery.
• Scout's Honor
I didn't remember it from the title but only needed to read a couple of lines for it to come back. I liked the setting and was intrigued to learn more, but it's a short story so there wasn't more. I didn't care for the bleakness or thugs-in-charge motif. Again, I wish more authors would stop reminding us of how horrible we can be and instead remind us of how good we can be. The world needs positive role models, not negative ones. Holy shit, look at the number of people who think 1984 was a how-to guide instead of a warning.
• D.E.A.T.H.
This one was okay. Intriguing idea, but handled poorly. I get that that was partially because the author needed to tell a story but it was hard to set it aside while reading.
You have a computer program that could literally kill everyone on Earth, but we let one guy make updates to it with no checks and he can push it straight to production. If that program existed the security on it would be insane because the number of people trying to hack into it would be insane. That would be a huge target. Also nations. No nation is going to give another nation the ability to just turn off all of their citizens. Or, I guess you could just turn off the ones in the military. Do you even need to do that? No, I think the nation in control just blackmails the others. They turn off the leaders of the target country until they get one who's cooperative. I enjoyed this one more than most of the stories, but that was a lot of disbelief to suspend.

Overall I think the author and I aren't on the same wavelength. Some of this was the problem of short stories, where you don't get much time to get to know the characters. That was my issue with Hungry, although I notice now that it was the one that came closest to the positive role models I mentioned. I'm tempted to try a longer work from the author, but I suspect it wouldn't work for me. 😕 I did like that she had a few lines at the end of each story about where the idea came from. ( )

This was a diverse collection of short stories - both in characters and sub-genre. I like that the stories are short enough that you can read one, set the book down, and pick it up again later when you only have time for a quick read. Although some of the themes are a bit dark, that doesn't make this any less of an enjoyable read. If you're into spec fiction that flirts with sci-fi, thriller, and horror elements, you're likely to enjoy reading this! ( )

Enjoyable short stories from an author clearly versed in the genre Oak has compiled a collection of mostly near-future sci-fi tech dystopias that, as a whole, fit really well together. One note aside, there aren't many spaceships in a collection appropriately named as such, with more earthbound stories than not. But such a minor detail barely affects the reading experience or pleasure. A whole-rounded experience and my favorite read of the month. ( )

A collection of SF themed short stories, and novellas, which I mostly enjoyed. Frequently verging on teh darker side they worked quite well wit he punchy finish. A couple of them had obviously been taken from other themed works as for example christmas SF short stories are not common otherwise, but they all worked well.

Compared to the author's fantasy collection these were all better stories, worked better in a short format and generally just crafted more appropriately to the format. ( )