The Only Harmless Great Thing
Brooke Bolander
Tor
Fiction, Sci-Fi
Themes: Alternate Timelines, Anthropomorphism, Girl Power, Plagues
*****
Description
In the early 1900's, the job of painting radium watch dials belonged to girls... but they sickened and began to die. Even as the companies tried to
discredit their tales of radiation poisoning, they sought alternate workers. They turned to elephants, who were still considered animals despite their
trunk sign language having been known since the 1800's. But, though elephants can absorb more radiation before sickening, they still eventually die of
it - until one elephant, Topsy, has had enough.
Generations in the future, a scientist struggles to convince an elephant matriarch to cooperate with a plan that will, if it succeeds, potentially
outlive the human race - and save at least some elephants forever.
Review
Winner of the 2019 Nebula award for Best Novelette, The Only Harmless Great Thing translates the plight of the Radium Girls (real-life victims of corporate greed and misogyny, hired to paint glowing watch dials and exposed to lethal levels of radiation licking the radium paintbrushes to keep the points fine, after which the company owners tried to blame syphilis for their deaths) to an alternate history where humans have learned that elephants are self-aware and can speak - but are still considered animals to be exploited. It also taps into the generational power of storytelling to preserve (or distort) truths, and creates an elephant culture centered around tales shared from mother to daughter and aunt to niece, based around how actual herds work. (In fact, elephant matriarchs are the evident keepers of migration memories at the very least, and herds do visit the remains of their dead. For all we know, there may be more truth to this tale than we yet realize - or will ever realize.) Topsy and the radiation-poisoned girl Regan bond over their common exploitation at the hands of men, while in our time the scientist Kat struggles to solve a riddle that even now vexes us: what to do about radioactive waste that will outlast our civilization at least, and quite likely our species. It's a soul-twisting tragedy on multiple levels, a story of inhumanity and sacrifice and how our short-sighted species creates far more evil and sorrow than we can ever realize, both of which will linger long past our own time on this world.