"The Voluntary State"

2004 Rowe, Christopher (b. 1969). “The Voluntary State.” SciFiction www.scifi.com/scifiction/ Posted May 5, 2004. No longer available online. Rpt. in The Year’s Best SF: Twenty-Second Annual Collection. Ed. Gardner Dozois (New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 2005), 58-83; Science Fiction: The Best of 2004. Ed. Karen Haber and Jonathan Strahan (New York: iBooks, 2005); Beyond Singularity. Ed. Jack Dann and Gardner Dozois (New York: Ace Books, 2005); Nebula Awards Showcase 2006. Ed. Gardner Dozois. New York: Roc, 2006); Rewired: The Post-Cyberpunk Anthology. Ed. James P. Kelley and John Kessel (San Francisco, CA: Tachyon Publications, 2007), 293-327; and in his Telling the Map: Stories (Easthampton, MA: Small Beer Press, 2017), 107-48. PSt, PU

Future dystopia in Tennessee in which everyone is controlled by a central computer contrasted with a free Kentucky. The story focuses on a successful attempt by men from Kentucky to destroy the computer. A related novella is “The Border State.” In his Telling the Map: Stories Easthampton, MA: Small Beer Press, 2017), 149-269 which is set further in the future when Tennessee has infected the rivers around the state with various machines that kill anyone that crosses them or get wet. Kentucky has means of temporarily neutralizing the machines. A related novel set later in time is his These Prisoning Hills. New York: Tordotcom, 2022.