Although we are both members of the Codex writers group, I know Gareth L. Powell mainly by reputation.  In addition to being a fiction writer, he is a freelance copywriter and PR consultant, and is a former software marketer. His fiction has appeared in Interzone and in the Shine anthology from Solaris (2010). His story Ack-Ack Macaque won the 2007 Interzone Reader’s poll for best short story. Gareth also has a regular interview and review gig with a music magazine out of the UK called Acoustic.
While I can say this about everything in the 2020 Visions anthology, Gareth’s story is a bit different from the other titles in the collection. His submission came in during my open call for optimistic fiction, and it is optimistic, but that isn’t what sets it apart.
His story is different in the sense that at first I had a bit of trouble suspending disbelief.  After reading it once, I set the story aside and came back to it later. Upon reading it a second time, I decided that the story doesn’t necessarily need to be taken at face value, and that the ending was meant to be more symbolic than an account of actual events. With that perspective, the whole story became something greater than perhaps even Gareth intended.
Gareth is from the United Kingdom. His story takes place in the United Kingdom, and it uses British English conventions like spelling and phrasing. When I asked him how he would feel about changing the story to Americanize it, he was open to the idea. However, after giving it some thought, I decided to leave the story as submitted. The story is written by a Brit and takes place in Britain, so why change an author’s natural language? Besides, I rather like British English.
Another reason I decided to leave the story in that style is that I originally wanted something of an international and inter-cultural flavor to the anthology. I managed to get a little bit of that, but not as much as I had hoped. (As a side note, I did have the opportunity for a story by Charles Tan of the Philippines, but the only story he had available would have been a reprint and I wanted all original material.)
So Gareth’s story, The Bigger the Star, the Faster it Burns, is the only story written British style, but that only helps to expand the diversity of the fiction between these covers. The story itself has to do with the discovery of alien artifacts, but like almost all the stories in the collection, it is really a story about people. It’s a fun story and a welcome respite from some of the darker fiction that appears in the anthology. Read it with an open mind and soak up the deeper meanings of this story.
